The Twelve Days of Cruisin for a Bruisin
by cherrygorilla
Summary: On the various days of Christmas the Teen Beach Movie characters are gifting you with little snippets of their life over the festive period. 12 characters, 12 stories. Happy Holidays! Disclaimer: Anything you don't recognise is mine.
1. Ice Wish it Could Be Christmas Everyday

**Hello!**

 **Like always, I'm super sorry that I haven't posted anything in so long; my life has just been taken over by exams so sadly my writing's taken a little bit of a backseat. I apologise for leaving all my other stories un-updated but after I've finished with this one I'll hopefully to get back into writing for Reality Check and Just Like Me again, I've got the next chapters for them planned out, I just need to actually find time to update them.**

 **But for now, here's the start of my Christmas story! And what better way to start a story off than with a little bit of Mack and Brady fluff? ;)**

On the first day of Christmas Brady got from Mack, a trip to the ice rink that didn't quite go to plan…

Mack thought that it would be a cute idea to take Brady to the ice rink on a little date. The fairy lights, the crisp air and the leisurely skating beside each other with their mitten-covered hands held between them, what could be better?

Well it turns out that Mack actually being able to ice skate would make it better…a _lot_ better.

Brady let out another soft laugh as Mack let out a sharp gasp and her left arm flailed wildly next to him. Her knuckles had turned white beneath her mittens from clinging onto the railing around the outside of the rink for dear life.

"You know what?" she said. "I think I'm getting better at this."

"Really?" Brady chuckled.

"I think this is working a lot better than what I was trying to do before," she said as she inched her way around the edge of the rink.

"Oh yeah, the shuffling's really paying off," Brady said in a teasing tone.

"Am I not supposed to be shuffling?" Mack asked. She took her eyes away from the ice in front of her for one second to raise her eyebrow at Brady, but that was still enough to send her feet wildly skidding in opposite directions until she lost all control and ended up on her bum again.

"No, because that's why you keep ending up like this," Brady said, effortlessly skating around to face her and helping her to her feet.

"Thanks," Mack mumbled. "I've got this," she then said with more determination. She then gripped back onto the railing, took a deep breath and began shuffling again.

"You sure about that?" Brady asked, skating along backwards in front of her.

"Positive," Mack said through gritted teeth. But then the toe of her ice skate's blade got caught in the ice and made her lurch forwards. Brady caught onto her forearms before she could fall too far, but Mack still let out a squeak of surprise.

"Don't worry, I've got you," Brady chuckled.

"I know, I know," Mack grumbled as she tried to balance herself again. She went back to her safety blanket of holding onto the side as she watched Brady skate a few strides forwards, all whilst still looking at her with a serene, yet amused smile curling at his lips. Mack made an attempt to move to join him but her ice skate practically ran away from her and she ended up slipping down the wall.

Brady was sure that he was witnessing the reincarnation of Bambi in human form, which is why he let out a rather large laugh.

"Don't laugh; I can't help sucking at this!" Mack exclaimed through giggles herself.

"Well one: I can't help laughing at you when you look like a giraffe that's learning to walk for the first time," he said, making Mack let out another laugh. "And two: the only reason that you suck is because you've never done it before."

"Having an excuse to fail doesn't mean that I'm not still failing."

"No but it gives you a little more confidence," Brady said with a small laugh.

"I don't think I can have any confidence when I'm skating around with you: Mr Figure-Skater of the year," Mack said sarcastically.

"Thanks," Brady chuckled. "But I'm only good because I come with my family every year," he finished with a flurry as he skated around to face Mack again and added an extra little spin on the end, following it up with a wink.

"Ok, no need to show off," Mack teased as Brady helped her up for what felt like the fiftieth time that afternoon.

"Come on, it's really not that hard if you know what to do."

"Well of course you can say that, you can actually do it," Mack said, crossing her arms over her chest before realising that that threw her off balance. And once again she found herself clinging onto Brady's arm.

"Look, we just need to get away from the edge-"

"Brady, no!" Mack retaliated as Brady started to slowly lead Mack away from the side of the rink.

"And just glide," he finished as he flashed a wicked smile.

"Yeah, that would go great if I knew how to glide," Mack snapped sarcastically.

"You just put one foot in front of the other and push off," Brady said, slowly starting to do it himself as he towed Mack along with him.

"That's easy for you to say," Mack said. "I don't think 'gliding' is something my body knows how to do."

Her legs shook a little as Brady gently pulled her along. He could tell how nervous she was even though she was trying to hide it. Mack didn't ever really like going out of her comfort zone, even when it was just ice skating.

But the longer they went on like this, the more confident Mack became. And soon enough she was skating (well, still kind of wobbling) around all on her own. That didn't mean that she'd occasionally catch her skate and grab onto Brady to steady herself.

"See, I told you you could do it. Look, you're a natural," Brady chuckled, letting go of her hand and watching her go skating off ahead all by herself.

"I wouldn't go that far," Mack called back to him, ungracefully waving her arms around to balance herself again.

"I disagree," Brady said, skating up behind and circling around her with ease.

"Ok, no need to show off," Mack teased. "And don't get too excited, our time slot's almost up."

"Aww, come on, just five more minutes," Brady whined, which just made Mack laugh and roll her eyes.

"No, we can't. And besides, there's a hot chocolate sitting in that café with your name on it."

"I'm not moving unless there's whipped cream involved."

"Well neither would I," Mack said, making Brady crack a laugh.

"Alright, fine," Brady chuckled as he grabbed her mitten-covered hand.

"What are you doing?" Mack asked, looking on at Brady in amused bewilderment as he began to pull her towards him and then proceeded to attempt to twirl her.

This probably seems like it would have been a lovely romantic moment with the sparkling fairy lights and Christmas music floating out from the wall-mounted speakers. And if would have been if they hadn't been on ice skates. Mack was already incredibly clumsy on them; she struggled with just going in a straight line with them on, so attempting anything else was bound to go horribly wrong, especially a spin. So, as I'm sure you can imagine, the only way that this was going to end up was with them both laying in a tangled heap on the floor.

"That was probably the dumbest idea you've ever had," Mack snorted as both teens sat on the ice laughing their heads off.

"I know," Brady wheezed, which just set him off laughing again. And they proceeded to laugh border-line hysterically for minutes on end. Every time that they tried to compose themselves they'd end up setting off laughing again.

"You're so stupid," Mack eventually chuckled, whacking his leg with her mitten.

"Well it's taken me years of practice to get this good," Brady chuckled, sitting up behind her and wrapping her in his arms. "Now," he said quietly, still trying to supress his giggles. "How does that hot chocolate sound?"

"Perfect," Mack smiled, twisting her head to peck him on the cheek.

 **So, how was that? I hope you enjoyed it! I haven't written anything in absolutely ages so I'm a little out of practice. I think it turned out alright though, what do you think? I know it's a little on the short side for most of my chapters but I'm afraid that they're going to have to be that way because of the nature of this story. Hopefully you don't mind too much though. They're probably easier to read this way anyway.**

 **Speaking of the nature of this story, my plan for it is to have a separate chapter dedicated to each character (since there are 12 of them). And because that means that I need to write a lot of chapters, I'm going to make them a little shorter than I normally would so that I'm not so stressed to get everything done. Knowing me, I will end up getting super stressed though. XD**

 **I've pretty much got all of the characters' chapters planned out but, if you have any ideas that you desperately want me to use then please let me know because I would greatly appreciate it! Especially if it's an idea for Lugnut's chapter because I don't have one for him yet (preferably something linked to a Christmas fair, but that doesn't really matter).**

 **Um, I think that's all I have to say for now. Thank you for reading! See you next chapter!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	2. O Christmas Tree

**Hi! I'm back with chapter 2!**

 **I know it's been a while since my last chapter but I've had a super busy week again, hopefully I'll be able to update more regularly next week because that's when I break up from school.**

 **But anyway, here's Lela's chapter!**

On the second day of Christmas Lela got from Butchy, two jobs left to do on her own.

* * *

Just as Lela finished swirling the spoon around in her mug of peppermint hot chocolate, she heard a shout from the hallway.

"Lela?" her brother called.

"Yeah?"

"I's headin' out."

"What? Why?" Lela asked, grabbing her pink snowman mug and marching into the hallway to follow her brother. Her fluffy white slipper boots slapped against the floorboards furiously as she went.

"'Cause I have plans," Butchy said simply, slipping on his leather jacket. As it was growing closer and closer to winter, Butchy had finally had to put away his leather vest in favour of a coat with actual sleeves so that he didn't freeze.

"With who?" Lela demanded. Her eyebrows were firmly furrowed and her free arm was crossed across her chest in annoyance.

"What's it to you?" Butchy snorted, clearly not seeing the severity in the situation that his sister did.

Lela just sighed and rolled her eyes at him. "What about _our_ plans?" she asked.

"What plans?" Butchy asked, seeming to be genuinely curious.

"Do you actually have a brain in that big head of yours?" Lela snapped, frowning at her still oblivious brother.

"Yous had better look into that one," Butchy replied sarcastically. "I ain't too sure."

"Butchy, we were supposed to be decorating the house today," Lela whined.

"I ain't gots to be here for it, have I?" Butchy asked, grabbing his keys off the table in the hall.

"Well, yeah," Lela said. But Butchy didn't look like he was changing his mind. "Where are you even going?"

"None of your business, Sis," Butchy smirked as he moved to open the door.

Lela just found herself rolling her eyes at him again. She struggled to find words to use with Butchy sometimes because most of the time she would just end up letting out frustrated squeaks and whacking him. "Fine, have a nice time," she sighed in defeat.

"Thanks," Butchy called as he swung open the front door.

"Don't stay out too late," Lela said.

"It's 2:30pm," Butchy said, clearly baffled by Lela's comment. But Lela knew that that didn't mean anything when it came to her brother. He could go out in the morning at 9:00am and easily not return until 11:30pm; it had happened on several occasions. "Alright, fine," he said after noting Lela's unimpressed expression and deciding not to press the matter further.

"If you pass the Christmas tree place then bring back a tree for us," Lela called as Butchy strode down the drive.

"Yeah, right," Butchy scoffed, immediately unwilling to administer the task.

Lela couldn't be bothered to argue with her brother anymore, so she shut the front door and settled herself in the living room. If she wasn't decorating the house today then she was going to use that time to do something equally as productive and festive: planning the Christmas fair that she had offered to help organise this year.

No longer than five minutes had passed since she had started though when a voice singing Christmas songs through the open window made her almost spill the remnants of her drink all over herself.

"Tanner!" Lela cried, practically choking on her of hot chocolate.

"Hi," Tanner said, leaning on the windowsill and grinning goofily at her.

"What are you doing?" Lela asked, setting her mug and clipboard down.

"I just thought I'd drop in and surprise you."

"You surprised me alright," Lela sighed, shaking her head at him. But she couldn't quite manage to get rid of the smile on her face. She got up off the couch and went to go and greet him at the window by giving him a quick peck on the lips.

"Hey, what do you call this? I thought you were supposed to be putting your decorations up today," Tanner started as a mischievous grin replaced his signature dopey one.

"I call this rearranging my plans to fit around Butchy's," Lela sighed.

"Why?"

"He's gone out," Lela mumbled.

"With who?"

"Don't ask me."

"Aww, I'm sorry, Lela," Tanner said, taking her hand in his.

"Don't be, it's not your fault that I'm not Christmas-ifying the house," she said, giving his hand a gentle squeeze and swinging it back and forth between them as she mustered a smile.

"Who said anything about not Christmas-ifying the house?" Tanner chuckled, his mischievous grin returning in a split second.

"Me," Lela chuckled miserably. "My personal 'Santa's Little Helper' isn't so willing to help and has left me sad _and_ Christmas tree-less."

"I can get you a Christmas tree."

" _And_ decoration-less because I can't get into the attic by my- wait, what did you say?" Lela asked, getting distracted partway through what she was saying.

"I can get you a Christmas tree," Tanner repeated, starting to laugh again at Lela's startled expression.

"What? Like, now?" Lela asked, unsure of what he was trying to say.

"Yeah, I've got a car, let's go pick one out," he chuckled.

"Are you serious? Right now?" Lela asked, hardly able to believe what she was hearing.

"Yeah, why not?"

"Tanner!" Lela cried, throwing her arms around him out of pure joy. But it didn't quite work out as well as she'd hoped because of the added difficulty of the window being there.

"Grab your coat and I'll go grab my car," Tanner said once they'd parted, giving her hand one last tiny squeeze.

"Ok," Lela grinned, dropping his hand and leaning against the window frame to watch him go. As silly as it sounded, when Tanner did little things like this to make her happy she truly felt like the luckiest girl in the world.

* * *

"Have you got your coat?" Tanner called, hopping out of the driver's seat and strolling down the drive towards her.

"Have you got your car?" Lela joked, locking up the house before hugging her pale grey winter coat to her body.

"Yeah, and my team of backup," Tanner said, signalling over his shoulder for his friends to follow suit and exit the car. Although, they kind of spilled out rather ungracefully in fits of giggles or grumbles; it was always one or the other when they were all together.

"You didn't have to round everyone up, you know," Lela said as her gaze drifted from her friends to Tanner in joyous disbelief.

"Well you lost one 'elf' so I brought you five," Tanner said jokingly, glancing back at Struts, Lugnut, Seacat, Rascal and Coral, who he had all dragged back with him from Big Momma's. "I wasn't about to let you do all this by yourself."

"Tanner, you're the sweetest," Lela said, cupping his cheek in her hand before planting a kiss on his lips.

"So I've heard," Tanner smiled. "But do you know what's sweeter? The festive complementary fudge at the Christmas tree place," he grinned, ushering Lela towards his car.

"They have free fudge this year? What happened to the crappy candy canes?" Lela asked.

"I don't know but I certainly don't miss them," Tanner chuckled as he opened the door for Lela to get in the car.

* * *

The rest of the day couldn't have gone any more perfectly in Lela's eyes. Well, excluding the great Christmas tree disaster that was the result of Tanner uttering the fateful words: "Alright, pick out any one you want." At first they may seem rather innocent, but after Lela's eyes lit up like the star of Bethlehem there was bound to be trouble. And that's how they left the Christmas tree place with the largest Christmas tree they had on sale. Clearly Lela had been overwhelmed by the immensely exciting task of picking out the tree though because she didn't quite seem to consider how on earth they were supposed to get the monstrous tree into her house, let alone decorated. But this didn't even become apparent to the group until they tried to carry it inside and only managed to fit around 2ft of it through the door.

A lot of sawing later, the tree was up in the living room. The entire first floor was carpeted with Christmas tree branches and the tree itself was still kind of wedged into the corner it was in, but it was up and that was all that mattered because now they could begin decorating. And decorate they did.

* * *

Just as the teens' giggle-filled fourth rendition of Santa Claus Is Coming To Town was coming to an end, Butchy strolled through the front door to find Lela and Tanner adding the final touches to the garland that lined the staircase.

"Lela?" Butchy asked warily. His eyes slowly panned around the hallway, trying their best to take in everything that had been put there since he'd left the house earlier that day. Snowflakes lined the walls, fairy lights ran up the banister, a wreath sat on pretty much every single door in sight and the floor was still covered in pine needles, more pine needles than Butchy had ever seen in his life.

"Oh, hey Butch," Lela chirped as a mischievous smile twisted at her lips.

"'Sup Butchy," Lugnut said, walking through the hallway from the living room and then straight out the front door with a bundle of Christmas tree branches in his arms ready to throw away.

"Lugnut?" Butchy questioned, thinking that he'd imagined the biker boy out of the sheer shock of seeing him there. But Lugnut was already out the door by the time that Butchy found any words to speak. "Lela, what's all this?" he then demanded, eventually finding composure.

"I thought I'd brighten the place up a bit while you were out," Lela said sweetly, but her wicked smile told Butchy everything he needed to know.

"'Brighten it up a bit'? The house looks like a freakin' grotto!" Butchy exclaimed, looking at Lela like she was insane.

"Well, 'tis the season to be jolly," Lela giggled, teasingly patting Butchy on the head before swiping a red present bow from one of the many boxes of decorations scattered around the house and balancing it on his head with a giggle.

As much as Butchy was trying to be a 'bah humbug' about all of this decorating, she could tell that he did actually quite like it, which was soon confirmed when Butchy replied with "Fa la la la la, la la la la," in a monotone voice, despite the smile that was pulling at his lips.

And that little victory, along with spending the day with her friends had just made her festive season all the more perfect.

 **There you go! I hope you enjoyed it! I know it wasn't the best but I've never been very good at writing stuff for Lela and Tanner. At least I tried though, right? Anyway, I'm always my worst critic so let me know what you thought of it!**

 **Thank you so much for the 3 reviews I got (we're doing better than my failure of a Halloween story already XD). Owllover34, thank you for your suggestion! It's really helped me out and I can't wait to get writing that chapter now! CrazyTeenBeacher, I'm sorry to disappoint you but I'm kind of making it so that the chapters follow on from one another, so adding in a Mack and Lela chapter now would be kind of difficult. I do have a few other Mack and Lela stories though (2 on my Tumblr page and 1 as a part of my Valentine's day story from earlier this year) if you were interested in reading those. And KellyH, I'm so glad you enjoyed it! I know you love Mack and Brady stuff so I'm pleased that I could deliver something that you liked. I just hope you like the rest of the chapters as much as you liked that one. XD**

 **Anyway, I think that's all for now! Stay tuned for the next chapter, which will be centered around Seacat. Until then, thank you for reading and don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	3. Frosty Oh-No Man

**Hello! Guess who's horrendously behind on her writing? That's right, me!**

 **But, considering that I've managed to write this in the two hours of free time I've had since posting my last chapter, I don't think that it's too bad. Once I finish with school though I'll hopefully be able to dedicate a little more of my time to this story so that I…you know…get it done.**

 **For now though, here's Seacat's chapter!**

On the third day of Christmas Seacat got from CheeChee, three snowballs thrown at his head…kind of…

* * *

Upon hearing the news that the park a few miles from the Wet Side Story village area was blanketed in snow (and the beach clearly wasn't going to be any time soon) Seacat and his little brother Eric knew exactly what they were doing with their day. By noon the boys had rounded up their friends and were well into their battle; each side's soldiers were scattered across the field that was blanketed in what looked like crushed pearls and were frantically rolling snowballs as if their lives depended on it.

Even though on the car journey there Seacat had been informing his team of surfers that they were going to let Eric win (but wouldn't let him know that), when it actually came down to it Eric's team of fellow 14 year old school friends weren't that bad. To be honest, they were kind of making it hard for Seacat and his friends not to let them win.

"Take that, Sam!" Eric shouted at his brother after hitting him square in the back.

Seacat, who had been talking to Finn (one of his team members and perhaps the funniest person he had ever met), spun around to face his brother, chuckling in disbelief. "Oh, so it's like that, is it?" he called to his brother as he balled up another clump of snow.

"Yeah, what are you gonna do about it?" Eric taunted.

"Oh, I think you know," Seacat smirked, preparing to throw the snowball as another one hurtled past his head and hit Kiki's arm.

"You're gonna miss!" Eric cried.

And he did. Whether it was on purpose or not though was knowledge that only Seacat could handle.

If Rascal was laughing at Seacat before, when he had been hit on the back, then he was practically hysterical now. But a snowball to the face from Eric's best friend Joseph soon shut him up.

"Nice one, Joseph," Seacat chuckled, watching in amusement as Rascal wiped the powdery snow from his eyes.

"Nice one, Joseph," Joseph said, mocking him, which caused him and Eric to start laughing.

"Hey, Joseph, don't you have somewhere better to be? Like…I don't know…a stable with your pregnant girlfriend?" Seacat asked sarcastically, attempting a joke that referenced the Nativity story.

"No, that's on Thursday," Joseph quipped, making Seacat let out a laugh of his own.

"Was that your idea of a joke?" Eric scoffed.

"Yeah, I'm hilarious, aren't I?" Seacat said in the same sarcastic tone.

"You're so dumb," Eric laughed softly, shaking his head at his big brother.

"Not as dumb as you, Little Bro," Seacat shot back with a grin, sneakily launching another snowball at him; with extreme precision this time. The thing is though; this 'extreme precision' meant that the snowball hit its target perfectly. But it just so happened that the 'target' it hit wasn't the target it was supposed to hit since Eric ducked down at just the right moment to grab some more snow. The victim of the flawlessly thrown snowball happened to be none other than Seacat's girlfriend.

The (rather large) snowball hit CheeChee right in the side of the head as she was walking by, but this stopped her in her tracks. All she'd been doing was going into the town centre to do a little bit of last minute Christmas shopping, so being pelted with ice wasn't exactly something she'd been expecting.

Seacat sort of just stood there for a second before the reality of what had just happened really hit him (like a snowball would), which is when he started to laugh. It was kind of disjointed at first out of sheer disbelief but before he knew it he was practically doubled over laughing at what he'd done.

CheeChee, who was too shocked to move at first, knew exactly who had thrown that snowball the second she heard that laugh. She slowly turned to face him and then just stared at him in utter perplexity. Every time he looked like he was going to try calling something to her from the field he just fell about laughing again. And each time he did that, the madder CheeChee got. As cute as she normally found Seacat when he was laughing, when it was at her expense it suddenly wasn't so cute anymore. So Seacat soon found CheeChee marching across the stretch of grass towards him.

Seacat, still laughing, started to make his way over to meet her because, upon looking at her choice of footwear, he knew that she was not making it very far across the field at all. And he was right. After countless teens had trampled across the snow that lay over the grass, it had been packed together and worn down so that it was now more like ice. And Seacat knew for a fact that CheeChee's wedged boots didn't have grips anywhere near strong enough to get her very far across the snowball battlefield. So it didn't surprise him when CheeChee slipped and fell flat on her bum...it did make him start laughing even harder though.

"Seacat!" CheeChee cried, practically furious (soaking wet and freezing) by now.

"Don't worry Chee, I'm coming," he called back, still laughing at her.

"I ain't bothered about ya comin' anywhere-" but CheeChee's frustrated grumbles as she attempted to get to her feet were cut off when Seacat slipped on the same patch of ice that she had. He too completely lost his footing and, after a failed attempt to regain his balance, fell straight on top of CheeChee.

CheeChee let out an initial squeak of surprise but once they were both laid in the snow a sort of bewildered silence fell over them. They just found themselves staring at each other. Neither one of them even thought to move, they just kind of laid there.

The cold seeped through CheeChee's back and the snow clung to her hair, but all she could find herself thinking about was: "Your eyes look really pretty."

Seacat's slightly shocked, slightly embarrassed look turned to one of complete confusion before he burst out laughing again. And this time CheeChee joined in. "What?" he eventually managed to splutter, which just made CheeChee laugh harder.

She tried to answer him several times but just found that she started giggling harder every time, just like he had prior to this. "I don't know...I think it's because of the snow," she laughed.

"What?" Seacat repeated. Both teens were on the brink of hysteria now and didn't know how they were ever going to stop laughing.

"Like the reflection of the snow is makin' 'em...sparkle," CheeChee started, but found herself giggling again by the end of it. CheeChee never found herself laughing like this with anyone else, but almost every time that she and Seacat were together they got the giggles about something, no matter how ridiculous it is.

Just as Seacat was opening his mouth to reply, a snowball hurtled towards them both and, once again, nailed CheeChee in the face. Naturally, he burst out laughing again (throwing a snort in there too for good measure). And a shout from his little brother just made him (and even CheeChee this time) laugh even harder.

"Hey, you two, get up or get a room!"

"Come on, we've been told off now," CheeChee giggled, trying to shift in the snow to get up.

"Don't worry, I'll get Eric back for that later," Seacat chuckled once he'd helped CheeChee to her feet.

"Allow me," CheeChee smirked, bending down to scoop up some of the snow. And to Seacat's great delight, she pelted it at him with immense accuracy.

Eric's expression was priceless, especially after CheeChee teasingly waved at him when he turned around.

"And that is why I love you," Seacat chuckled, loosely looping his scarf around her neck.

"I should be really mad at you right now," CheeChee said, trying her hardest to muster a frown as the melting snow continued to seep through her clothes. But when Seacat used his scarf to pull her towards him so that he could wrap his arms around her, her scowl dissolved into a blissful smile. "But I can't."

"Hmm, I wonder why," Seacat said sarcastically, matching her smile before pressing a kiss to it.

Little did Seacat know though, CheeChee had a second bundle of snow hidden in the palm of her glove. He did discover this though when she dumped it on top of his head mid kiss.

"CheeChee!" he exclaimed in shock. But he was still choking back laughs as he brushed the snow from his hair and CheeChee looked on in fits of giggles herself. "Oh, it's gone down my back!" he then shrieked, squirming as the first few crumbs of snow tumbled down the neck of his coat.

"Enjoy! I'm off to go shopping!" CheeChee called, flashing him a bright smile before fleeing the scene, giggling the whole way.

"CheeChee!" Seacat shouted again, running after her and grabbing her by the waist. He spun her around as she laughed and tried to break out of his grip. Her laugh, crystal clear and almost musical, expressed nothing other than what Seacat could describe as relaxed, yet overwhelming joy. Her laugh lit a fire in him that filled him with so much warmth he feared he would melt the snow. And, above the excited hollers of the warring snowballers, her laugh was the finishing touch in completing Seacat's definition of pure bliss.

 **Well, what do you think? I hope you liked it! I thought the idea was quite cute for this chapter but I don't know if I carried it out well enough.**

 **Thank you for the lovely reviews again, you know how much they mean to me! Guest, I'm so glad that you liked it! And thank you Owllover34, I'm so pleased you enjoyed it and don't worry girl, I've got you covered next chapter. ;)**

 **I think that's all I have to say for now though. I promise I'll get the next chapter up as soon as I'm done with it.**

 **Thank you for reading! Don't forget to leave a review! :)**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	4. Santa Baby

**Hello! I'm back!**

 **Guess who wrote this whole (kind long, actually) chapter in less than a day? Me! Ah, I'm so proud of myself; I don't think I've ever done this before (don't hold me to that though). And considering that I've had to fit my writing around my revision timetable (*sarcastic* yay, fun), I think I've done a pretty good job.**

 **I kind of hated this chapter at first but, the further I got into it the more I started to enjoy it. (I think that's just because writing the starts of chapters is awful though). But anyway, this is for you, Owllover34. Here's your Struts & Lugnut chapter!**

On the fourth day of Christmas Struts got drunk…from four glasses of eggnog.

* * *

Struts was completely oblivious to the fact that the more of her mother's eggnog she consumed, the more the brandy in it started to hit her. Struts had been left at home decorating the Christmas tree while her mum, her (probably) soon to be stepdad and his two (adorable) little boys went to visit the Santa Claus at the mall, and, to save herself from getting bored, she had decided to invite over Lugnut to help.

After helping decorate Lela and Butchy's place earlier that week Lugnut considered themselves pros at this anyway, so he didn't mind accepting the offer at all. And besides, when was he ever going to turn down an offer to spend time with Struts.

As chaotic and hilarious as the task of decorating Lela and Butchy's house had been, it had been a relatively simple task (well, a simple task on a huge scale). And since Struts just had one tree to decorate (compared to Lela's entire house) he had expected them to be done rather quickly so that they could move onto… _other_ things. But alas, when Struts started sneaking sips of eggnog from the jug her mum was keeping in the fridge, Lugnut saw all hopes of that slipping away with Struts' common sense.

The moment that he knew she was well and truly done with even attempting to act moderately sensibly was when she had disappeared into the hallway to get something and had returned with a long strand of silver tinsel draped around her neck. She stopped in the door way and clumsily struck a pose with so much force that Lugnut thought she had put her hand through the wall.

"Lovely," Lugnut chuckled, still startled from the sudden noise.

"Look what I found!" Struts exclaimed, doing a little spin towards him as she held the tinsel out around her.

"Are we putting that on the tree?" Lugnut asked, attempting to take the tinsel away from her.

"Well, it would look good on the tree…" Struts began, walking straight past Lugnut to stand in front of the tree. "But I think it looks much better on me," she giggled, wrapping the tinsel around her like a feather boa before spinning around to face him and striking another pose. "I feel like a movie star!"

"You are one," Lugnut chuckled, even more amused by Struts' antics when she let out a large gasp in response.

"You're right!" she cried. "Do you think we ever made a Christmas special?"

"You know, I don't think we did," Lugnut said, having to stifle a laugh when he caught sight of Struts' look of utter dismay.

"Are you tellin' me we didn't make a sequel where the Rodents save Santa and the surfers all give up their lives to become elves?"

"I wish," Lugnut laughed, unsure whether Struts was being serious or not anymore.

"Well I think it woulda been a hit," Struts said, throwing one end of the tinsel over her shoulder and sauntering over to the window sill, where she had balanced her latest glass of brandy-laced eggnog.

"Woah, woah, woah," Lugnut said, hurrying to swipe the glass out of her hands.

"Lugnut, give it back you little sh-"

"You've had enough," he said, holding it out of her reach.

"I've only had a few sips," Struts protested.

"Yeah, sure," Lugnut said sarcastically.

"Look, I'm fine," Struts said, but when she almost lost her footing after attempting a step forwards she soon realised otherwise. "Woah, you're right, maybe I should lay off it," she then giggled after Lugnut lunged to catch her arm.

"I think yous is more of a milk and cookies girl," Lugnut chuckled, downing the remainder of the eggnog in the glass so that she wasn't tempted again.

"Like Santa!" she gasped, her eyes flying wide open as she excitedly scurried over to the decoration box. She rummaged around in it for a few seconds before bringing out an ornament shaped like the jolly character himself and dangling it in front of her eyes. "There, that's the finishing touch it needed," she said as she proudly hung it on the tree. "Doesn't it look great?" she then asked, spinning around to check for some sign of approval from Lugnut.

"Struts…it's half-done," was all he said though.

"What do you mean?" she asked, turning to look at the tree again.

"It's got like ten things on it. All we've got on are the lights and the fancy ornaments your mom always talks about."

"But we've been doin' this forever," Struts whined.

"You mean I've been doin' this forever," Lugnut corrected with a chuckle. "You've been stealin' drinks from the kitchen and dancin' around in a Santa hat."

"Hey, where did I leave the Santa hat?" Struts asked. Her attention was very easily averted to this new ask, which once again left Lugnut sorting through the box of baubles by himself until she returned. "I've got it," she hollered, skipping back into the room swinging it in her hand.

"Good," Lugnut said chirpily to play along with her. He didn't even protest when she slipped it onto his head.

"Hey, how is it that you even look good in this?" she giggled, standing back to admire him.

"Effortless charm," Lugnut said, only half-joking.

"I bet you'd look good in _only_ that too," she snorted, ungracefully winking at him as he just lightly shook his head at her and laughed to himself.

"Struts, focus," Lugnut chuckled, taking her by the hand and leading her back over to the decoration box.

"On what?"

"Decorating the tree," he said, enunciating every word as clearly as he could so that it might actually register as something in her alcohol-clouded brain.

"I can't concentrate on that when you're stood here lookin' cute," Struts cried as if the idea was utterly ridiculous.

"Struts-" Lugnut tried as his smile widened and another bashful chuckle slipped from his lips. But it was no use because Struts had already slipped away to the record player. He didn't see much point in trying to coax her back over if she was going to be about as useful as the tinsel she still had draped around her neck was, so he just left her to do her own thing.

But apparently Struts couldn't leave Lugnut alone to do his own thing.

Within seconds Struts was pressed against Lugnut's side quietly giggling to herself as a giddy smile spread across her face. "Santa, baby, slip a sable under the tree for me," she softly sung into his ear as he attempted to continue decorating.

"Struts-" he began, attempting to stop her. But again, Struts showed no signs of cooperating and just pressed a finger to Lugnut's lips if he tried to interrupt again.

"I've been an awful good girl," she continued in the same hushed, lustful tone with an occasional giggle thrown in there too. "Santa, baby, so hurry down the chimney tonight."

Every now and then, although Lugnut mostly just let Struts sing and prance around to her hearts content, he'd jump in with little comments to amuse her further.

"Think of all the fun I've missed," she'd sing.

"Like what?" he'd reply.

"Think of all the guys that I haven't kissed," she'd continue, ignoring him and choosing to dance with her tinsel feather boa instead.

"Like who?"

"Next year I could be just as good if you check off my Christmas list," she finished, tapping Lugnut's nose in time to the last few words. All he had time to do was chuckle (and blush a little bit) before Struts flounced off and began singing again.

She almost knocked over a lamp when attempting to mimic an angel as she sung the line: "I've been an angel all year" and then nearly gave Lugnut the same fate when she hip-bumped him and knocked him off his feet. "Santa, cutie," she continued to sing (and giggle) as she helped Lugnut steady himself again. "There's one more thing I really do need: the deed to a platinum mine."

"So just a small present then?" Lugnut chuckled teasingly.

"Uh huh," she nodded and shot him another giddy grin before toying with his Santa hat and continuing to sing. "Santa, baby, so hurry down the chimney tonight." Struts then scurried over to the Christmas tree, where Lugnut presumed she was going to begin helping. But alas, she just struck another pose with her tinsel scarf and got the giggles…again. "Come and trim my Christmas tree with some decorations bought at Tiffany's." She punctuated that line with a not so subtle shaking of her 'feather boa'. "I really do believe in you," she sung to Lugnut before looping the tinsel around his neck and shooting him a rather suggestive look as she sung the line: "Let's see if you believe in me."

If Lugnut hadn't been blushing before then he certainly was now. But naturally he was playing it off cool by just softly chuckling at her as she (finally) tossed the wretched tinsel to the side.

"Santa, baby, forgot to mention one little thing: a ring," Struts half laughed half sung as she jokingly flashed her ring finger at him. Lugnut, joining in with her laughter, decided to play along and got down on one knee as if he was going to propose. But Struts just did a little twirl and perched on his knee instead of accepting an imaginary ring from him. "Santa, baby, so hurry down the chimney tonight. Yeah, so hurry down the chimney tonight. So hurry down the chimney tonight." As she finished she coyly toyed with Lugnut's Santa hat again before leaning in to kiss him.

Just before they got too far though, Lugnut broke away and gave her an offer.

"Hey, we can continue this later if you help me finish decoratin'," he said quietly, not even bothered about the scent of alcohol that was woven into her breaths.

"Lugnut-" Struts began to whine, trying to use his t-shirt to pull him back towards her.

"The quicker we get it done, the quicker we can continue," Lugnut prompted, leading Struts back over to the tree yet again. Normally he would drop everything to 'continue' with Struts, but considering that Lugnut was trying to make a good impression with her mom, and she had specifically explained that she wanted the tree decorated by the time she and the boys got home, he was determined to get it finished.

"Fine," Struts sighed over-dramatically before flouncing over to the partially decorated Christmas tree. "But I'm still singin'," she jested with a playful grin.

"Hey, I'm not objectin' to the singin'," Lugnut chuckled, grabbing a red bauble out of the box to hang up. "I don't think I'm gonna be lettin' ya hold any of the breakable ones though," he added, making another laugh slip out of Struts' mouth.

* * *

"Rockin' around the Christmas tree, have a happy holiday," were the words that Struts' mum and her boyfriend heard being sung upon entering the house. After taking a peek into the living room they saw the two teens (apparently a lot sleepier and gigglier now than they had been a few hours ago when they'd left them) quietly singing away to the record and goofily dancing in front of the freshly decorated Christmas tree.

"Everyone's dancing merrily in the new, old fashioned way," they finished, striking poses in time with the fading beats of the music. As the giggling couple both turned to the doorway they caught sight of the two adults (and the two sleeping children in their arms) softly laughing to themselves and smiling fondly at them.

"Oh, mom, you're back," Struts said, trying to keep her voice down so that she didn't wake her (sort of) brothers. She'd sobered up a little bit now (emphasis on the 'little bit') so she wasn't as obviously tipsy as she had been three songs ago. "Did you have a nice time?"

"Yeah, the boys loved it," her mum said, smiling down at the four year old boy she had balanced on her hip.

"Joey couldn't get enough of it," William, her mother's boyfriend, added, ruffling the little boy's hair and adjusting the way he was holding his older son (Jackson, who was 6).

"Good," Struts said softly, mustering a smile, which only grew when Lugnut stepped up behind her and wrapped his arm around her waist.

"I guess I should get going now," Lugnut began, sensing that it was his time to leave.

"Nonsense," Struts' mother scoffed. "You don't need to go rushing off so soon."

"Are you sure, Miss Miller?" Lugnut asked.

"Absolutely, especially since you've decorated the place so nicely."

"Thanks," Lugnut replied bashfully as Struts just cheesily grinned up at him.

"It was all Lugnut," Struts gushed, gently laying a hand on his chest.

"Well, in that case you're free to stay the night," Struts' mother laughed airily, letting a small, knowing smile form on her face. It wasn't long since she'd been a teen herself (she'd had Struts when she was quite young, after all) so she knew when and when not to let things like this slide.

"Wait, really?!" Struts exclaimed, her eyes lighting up like the glowing fairy lights that were adorning the tree.

"And if you're willing to decorate as beautifully as this every year then you can stay as often as you like," her mother chuckled. "Goodnight," she added before disappearing out of the doorway and heading upstairs.

"God I love my mom," Struts sighed, turning to grin at Lugnut.

"I'm gonna have to join you on that opinion," Lugnut said, matching Struts' smile (but toning it down a little).

"Now, if I remember correctly, you owe me a little something," Struts said, beckoning him towards her with her finger.

"Well I guess I'm gonna have to pay up then," Lugnut sighed, mocking reluctance.

"Oh, if you have too," Struts smiled, joining in with the game. But she when Lugnut swept her off her feet and leant in to kiss her all she could do was start giggling. She did get that kiss though…and many more to follow.

 **So, what did you think? I hope you liked it!**

 **The two songs I included were Santa Baby and Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree (which is the song that inspired this chapter) if you hadn't recognised them already and wanted to know.**

 **Also, I know I said before that I only needed an idea for Lugnut's chapter but, upon looking back at the ideas I have written down, I don't really like the one I have for Butchy's (or Giggles') chapter. So if you have any ideas for one (possibly surrounding a Christmas party?) then I'd love to hear them!**

 **Again, thank you so much for the reviews on the last chapter! Guest, I'm glad to hear that you were excited for this chapter and I hope that it lived up to your expectations. And Owllover34, I'm so glad that you enjoyed the last chapter (I enjoy me some Cheecat too!) and I really hope that you liked this one (because I know how much you love Struts and Lugnut). Also, thank you for your review on A Night To Remember, I'm so pleased that you enjoyed the Struts and Lugnut parts I included in that. I really love reading your feedback!**

 **Well, that's all I've got to say. Thank you for reading! Don't forget to review! And I'll see you next chapter!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	5. Butchy, It's Cold Outside

**Hello! I'm back again!**

 **Once again, I've pushed myself to get this written in one day because (in case you hadn't already realised) I'm super-duper behind. *sarcastically* Yay!**

 **On with the chapter!**

On the fifth day of Christmas all that Giggles got were five strange looks from passers-by.

* * *

"Butchy…"

"Yeah?"

"…I'm cold," Giggles admitted. She automatically winced after she'd spoken though, mentally preparing herself for the onslaught of 'I told you so'-esque comments she knew she was going to receive.

"Hey Cold, I'm-"

"Butchy!" she whined. Out of frustration she went to shove the chuckling biker boy, which soon shut him up considering that he almost fell onto Kiki's and Shelley's moms' homemade bath bomb stall and then nearly collapsed the whole thing.

This stall was one of many set up in the market square of the town centre nearby the beach for a Christmas fair that Lela had helped to organise this year. Pretty much everyone from the beach (as well as many other people who lived in surrounding neighbourhoods) had attended either to man a stall or look around. Giggles and Butchy (for now at least) had chosen the latter, which is why they were strolling along the cobbled road, browsing at the numerous booths that were already lining the street.

Butchy mumbled a quick, rather embarrassing, apology to the two ladies before marching away from the scene as quickly as possible.

"That was all your fault," Giggles hissed. But she started to chuckle when she saw how red Butchy had turned.

"My fault?! You're the one who pushed me!" Butchy cried incredulously. His face soon melted into a fond smile though when Giggles did what she did best and, you know, started giggling.

"Well you shouldn't have made fun of me," she said, attempting (and failing to keep a straight face).

"Hey, if yous is gonna put the opportunity there then I's is gonna take it," Butchy chuckled, moving to hold her hand and then gently swinging their joined palms between them.

"It wasn't even a remotely good joke though; you could have at least-"

"Jeez, your hands are pretty cold, G," Butchy said, feeling the ice seeping out of Giggles' hands and creeping up the veins from his.

"I told you!" Giggles exclaimed.

"And I told you to put a coat on," Butchy shot back with a smug smile.

And there was the sting; this is exactly what Giggles knew was coming from the moment she started to shiver. "I know you did, but I didn't listen, did I?" Giggles sighed, hugging her arms around herself. When she dared a glance across at Butchy she just found him smirking at her, which wound her up more. "Look," she began, letting out another frustrated sigh. "I've lived by the beach my whole life; I'm not used to cold weather like this." But the longer she watched Butchy try to stifle a laugh, the harder it became to stifle hers. "I spend most of my time in bikinis; do you really think I think about wearing coats on a daily basis?"

"Well you should have today," Butchy said.

"Shut up," Giggles chuckled, gently nudging his arm in protest.

"I can't tell whether those snowflakes on your face are real or fake," Butchy teased, referring to the little snowflake pattern that ran down from Giggles' temple to the apple of her cheek.

"Hey, I was practicing; I'm helping out on the face-painting stall later," she said.

"Woah, woah, woah. What's this about you helpin' out on a stall? I know yous is a great artist and all but I wasn't plannin' on gettin' ditched tonight."

"Well you can come and help out too if you want," Giggles smiled encouragingly. But Butchy just looked at her as if she was crazy. "What?" she finally asked, having to stifle yet another laugh.

"Are you kiddin?'"

"No, why?"

"I can't draw a stick man."

"Well you could just hold my face-paints for me then," Giggles tried again.

"Am I really that good? Yous is gonna trust me with that?" Butchy asked sarcastically, mocking astounded joy. "Wow, G, I'm honoured."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, we get it, you don't need to milk it," Giggles said, rolling her eyes at him. "Look, I just want you to come and sit with me."

"To hold your beloved face-paint?" Butchy jested.

"No, to keep me company," Giggles corrected, with an almost smug smile tugging at her lips. "Why is it so hard to get you to spend time with me?" she teased.

"It ain't hard, I pretty much drop everythin' to hang out with you if the opportunity's there," Butchy snapped, not sensing Giggles' joking tone.

"I know you do," Giggles said, lightly chuckling as she placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "And that's what makes you such a sweetheart," she said, pressing a kiss to his cheek.

"You don't really think I don't spend enough time with you though, do you?" Butchy asked, apparently still concerned.

"Butchy, you're spending Christmas with me," Giggles chuckled. "I wouldn't worry about spending time with me if I were you."

"Hey, hey, hey, I thought we agreed: no more mentionin' that. You don't want me to have a panic attack, do you?" Butchy said (half joking, half not) as he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her in to his side.

"I don't know what you're so worried about-"

"I'm meeting you parents," Butchy said, once again staring at Giggles like she'd lost her mind.

"What are you talking about? You've already met my parents, you've seen them a bunch of times," Giggles said, taking her turn to look at Butchy like he was crazy.

"Seein' 'em for an not even an hour a couple of times ain't the same as spending almost a week with 'em, G," Butchy said.

Suddenly, from the way that Butchy was speaking, Giggles realised how nervous he actually was about this. She stopped in her tracks and turned to look at him properly, quizzically dipping one of her eyebrows in the process. "How on earth do you run a biker gang?" she asked him, fondly shaking her head at the slightly shocked biker boy.

"Whaddya mean?" he asked, looking more than a little puzzled.

"You are the softer than a cotton ball and about as tough as one too," Giggles said, finding herself laughing again at the disgruntled look she received from Butchy.

"Oh okay," Butchy said sarcastically, rolling his eyes at the giggling blonde.

"But, I have to admit, you do cover it up well," she added with a cheeky grin.

"You don't think the other Rodents are on to me then?" Butchy asked, ending up chuckling despite his best efforts to remain moderately serious. He was blaming that on Giggles; as soon as he saw her smile he just fell apart and turned into a grinning idiot. In fact, he was blaming her for making him into such a big softie. He'd always known that he wasn't as tough as he liked to make out that he was, but Giggles definitely brought that side of him out more than he'd like for her to. He had a reputation to keep up after all.

"No, I think you're fine," Giggles smiled, sinking back into Butchy's arms. She slipped both her arms around his stomach under his coat as Butchy laid his arm over her shoulders. But even spending a few mere seconds under his navy blue winter jacket had let warmth spread up her arms to the point where she'd completely forgotten about being cold. Out of sheer relief she hugged Butchy a little bit tighter.

And even though Butchy loved it, judging from the fact that they were struggling to walk in this position, he knew he had to say something. "G, you wanna let go now?"

"No," Giggles giggled mischievously, trying to bury herself further inside his fleece-lined jacket.

"G, we can barely move," Butchy chuckled in amusement.

"We can shuffle," Giggles called up to him.

"We can try," Butchy corrected, trying to adjust his coat so that it was covering as much of Giggles as possible.

"See, this is working," Giggles laughed because, contrary to her comment, their waddling around wasn't getting them very far through the maze of stalls at all.

"Look, why don't you just wear my coat instead," Butchy said, moving to take it off.

"No! Then _you'll_ freeze!" Giggles protested, pulling it further around them both.

"G, people are staring," Butchy chuckled, finding the puzzled stares that they were getting from onlookers strangely amusing.

"Who cares? I'm warm!" Giggles cheered triumphantly.

"Must be 'cause I'm so hot," Butchy said jokingly.

And that's when Giggles burst out laughing. Her tinkling laughter could still be heard even though it was buried under masses of navy blue fleece. And soon later Butchy followed suit and set off to laugh too. They were both shuffling around the Christmas fair, almost literally joined at the hip, half-swamped under a coat…how were they not going to start laughing? So that's how they spent most of their time that evening: giggling away with each other and snuggling up under that navy blue coat.

Giggles definitely still stood by her comment about Butchy, especially after today. He was both the toughest and the softest guy she had ever met. And no matter how hard he tried to convince her otherwise, she would still always see big, bad, biker Butchy as the giggling, sensitive sweetheart that she loved so dearly.

 **So…what did you think? (I know it kinda sucked but I really struggled to write this chapter so let's just go with it)**

 **I kind of got carried away with this one. I mean, I normally get carried away when writing these one-shot things (my initial ideas aren't even half of the end result, my imagination just kind of runs riot I suppose) but this one is a prime example of that. And that's because the last 400 words (not even that) was the all that I based off my initial prompt for this chapter...so yeah, I guess you could say that I let my imagination get carried away with itself.**

 **And thank you so much for the lovely reviews that you left on the last chapter! Guest, I'm so glad that you liked the song (and I hope that that chapter wasn't the reason why it 'was' your favourite Christmas song). And Owllover34, I'm so happy that you liked the chapter! I know how much you love Struts and Lugnut so I was really conscious of writing a good chapter for you, so I'm thrilled that you loved it! You guys make my day with your reviews!**

 **Also, don't forget to leave me an idea for a chapter revolving around Butchy; I still need an idea for one!**

 **I think that's everything I have to say for now though. Thank you so much for reading, don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	6. Merry Chrushmas Everyone

**Hello! I'm back (and even further behind).**

 **I know this probably should have been posted yesterday but I got bogged down with revision and this chapter dragged on for longer than it should have. But I just got carried away again. Sorry!**

On the sixth day of Christmas Coral got six wingmen (and women) to help her get a date.

* * *

Throughout the entire Christmas fair, above the noise of the chattering, bustling crowds, Lela had wanted a chorus of angelic voices singing Christmas carols to further entertain the passers-by. And so ten teens had been recruited (well thrown together is probably a better word) to carry out this task for her.

Coral, considering that she 'had a better voice than any angel and had no one to go to the fair with anyway', was among those teens. And since she adored performing, she didn't really mind helping out too much. In fact it was pretty perfect. The 'choir' were wedged between two stalls: the sweet stall (where Seacat and Rascal were currently serving customers whilst it's supposed owner: Summer and her boyfriend 'checked out the Christmas trees') and the gift-wrapping stand (that was being manned by Kiki and Reef), so Coral literally had all her friends around her, especially since CheeChee kept coming over and slipping everyone biscuits from the stall she was helping out on.

Just as they were finishing their rendition of 'Hark the Herald Angels Sing' and were graciously accepting the two rounds of applause they got (one being from Rascal and the other being from an old lady in a burgundy cloche hat) Finn (one of Coral's closest friends and a fellow choir member for the night) leant across to her.

"You having fun?" he asked.

Coral didn't even look up from her sheet music when she replied, but she still managed to meet his sarcastic tone. "You sure sound like you are," she smirked, only lifting her eyes to meet his once she had the music for their next song in front of her.

"Hey Coral, I don't think you hit those high notes properly," Seacat called across to her. His comments were completely coated in sarcasm too, just to lift everyone's spirit even further (not). "Or sung them loudly enough," he added, lightly prodding his ear before adding a little less sarcastically: "I think you might have actually made me deaf in my left ear."

"You're welcome," Coral chirped, keeping up her sarcastic tone.

"Hey, she needs to sing loudly, I don't have a clue what I'm singing otherwise," Pearl (the only other soprano in the tiny choir) chipped in, tossing her bright blonde ponytail over her shoulder and letting out little snorting giggle.

To add on to Pearl's comment Coral made eye contact with Seacat again and sent him a wink to wind him up further. "What can I say? The people love me," she joked, but he just laughed it off and went to serve another customer.

"He should try standing next to you," Shelley (another of Coral's very close friends) said, picking up her friends' sarcastic tone. "There's enough power in your voice to keep the town's Christmas tree lit up for a week."

"I keep telling her she should take up the job of replacing the foghorn off the shore of Sundown Cove but she won't listen," Finn sighed, earning his (usually more than) daily eye roll from Shelley.

"It doesn't pay well enough," Coral said, earning a laugh from Finn as a reward for playing along with him.

"Hey, at least she's in tune," Jax cut in, mumbling his comment just loud enough for Finn to catch. "I can't say the same about you."

"Okay then," Finn said, taking that as his cue to shut up. He just shook his head incredulously (hardly able to believe what the biker boy had said) and focused on sorting through his sheet music whilst Shelley chuckled away beside him.

"Jax, don't me a moron," Kitty snapped, sending her fellow Rodents member a disapproving look.

As her friends were chattering away and sorting themselves out for the next song, Coral her lifted her gaze from the black dots scattered across the page to the crowds of people strolling from stall to stall in front of her. Her eyes flitted from whining children that struggled against their mother's grip to elderly men and women taking great care looking over every item on each stall they passed to a group of surfer boys daring one another to carry out endless, stupid tasks. Until, by chance, her eyes fell onto a young man in a charcoal grey coat. From that moment her eyes seemed as if they were connected to him; they tracked his every move. She watched, transfixed, as he drew his hand from his pocket, led it past his chiselled jawline and ran it through his chestnut brown hair. And as soon as he turned to look vaguely in her direction she let out a small gasp and her music folder slipped from her grip.

"Woah, what are you doing?" Pearl asked, rushing to try to catch the folder before the papers spilled all over the ground.

Coral made no real effort to respond. A small murmur was all she managed to force out; she was focusing all her attention on the boy she'd caught sight of.

"Finn," Pearl started slowly, her worried gaze trained on Coral.

"What?" Finn asked. It turned out that Pearl had managed to capture Shelley's attention as well because both of the surfers turned to look at her. Pearl switched their focus to Coral though with nothing more than one look. "Coral?" Finn asked this time, though he sounded a little less concerned this time (he knew Coral well enough to know that it wouldn't be anything serious).

Coral just meekly lifted her hand to point to the boy, keeping her eyes fixed on him the whole time.

"Oh brother," Shelley sighed as soon as she realised who Coral was pointing to and put two and two together.

"Yes, he's a very nice boy, Coral," Finn said with an eye roll and a jokingly patronising tone.

But Coral didn't even care about her friends' teasing. They knew that she fell head over heels for guys all the time so this wasn't anything new, they just found it kind of amusing now. It was quite endearing how she melted at the sight of a possible (but never very likely when it came to her luck) suitor.

"Which one is he?" Pearl asked, still scouring the crowd.

"The one with brown hair in the grey-"

But Shelley's comment was cut off when the boy glanced across at the group of singers (that weren't presently singing) and flashed them what could only be described as a winning smile. It was appropriate though, he'd certainly won over Coral's heart, which has rapidly hammering away in her chest right now. The boy's smile not only showed on his lips but through his eyes too, and the dimple that appeared on his tanned cheek made Coral's knees weak to the point where she literally lost her balance and had to be caught by Finn.

"Okay, you've got it pretty bad this time, haven't you?" he asked, attempting to steady her on her feet again.

"You know what, he actually is pretty handsome," Shelley said, taking a second to stare at the boy herself.

"Handsome?! He's like a freaking God!" Coral cried, finally finding her voice.

"Okay, no need to rub it in for us mere mortals," Finn said jokingly. But the chuckle he was letting out for his own joke was cut off when Coral grabbed him by the shoulders and turned him to face her.

"I need to talk to him," she said with such determination that Finn was startled into believing her.

"Er, okay then," he stammered. "Do you wanna take a break for the next song?"

"She can't leave me to sing the descant by myself; I don't know it!" Pearl cried, horrified at the thought.

"She'd need more than three minutes with him anyway. I know Coral's fluent in flirting but he doesn't look like he's easy to crack," Shelley said, catching herself analysing the boy again and making herself blush.

"I can't just go and talk to him now," Coral hissed, suddenly overwhelmed by panic.

"Why not?" Finn asked.

"I need you to find some stuff you about him," she said, regaining her focus.

"Me?"

"Yes you," Coral snapped, shaking him by the shoulders.

"We're supposed to be singing," Finn protested.

Coral dropped her grip of Finn's shoulders, then fidgeted around a little and bit her lip as she thought for a second. But then another gasp passed her lips as she frantically whirled around to face Seacat and Rascal.

"Guys!" she hissed, instantly grabbing their attention.

"Yeah?"

"I need your help," she said, scurrying over to them. She slammed her hands down on their little fold out table and leaned over it, dazzling them with a pleading (yet rather desperate) smile.

"With what?"

"Ooh, are those apple bon bons?" she asked as her eyes lit up at the sight of the little pale green balls. Immediately she'd been distracted.

"Not for you," Seacat chuckled.

"Unless you have $3," Rascal added.

"Coral, focus," Shelley called across, trying to set the surfer girl straight.

"Right," Coral said, refocusing on her aim. "I need you to help me talk to a guy."

"I'd recommend starting with 'hello'," Seacat said sarcastically, earning a false smile from Coral in reply.

"Just help me find out a little bit about him," she begged. "Please; I really like him," she added, pleading more with her eyes than her words.

"What do you even want us to find out?" Seacat asked after heaving out a begrudging sigh. But this still showed Coral some promise that he was willing to help.

"Whatever you can," Coral babbled because Kitty was already calling her back over so that they could start the next song. "Oh and find me some mistletoe as a backup," she added, trying to sweeten the request with another smile before scurrying back over to the choir.

"For what?" Seacat called to her.

"What do you think?!" Coral called back, making Seacat jokingly shake his head at her in disbelief.

"What are you doing?" he then asked Rascal as his focus was soon shifted back to their stall.

Setting these aside," Rascal said, slipping three dollars into their money pot and sneakily bagging up some of the apple bon bons.

"Everyone teases Coral for falling hard for her crushes but you're no better," Seacat smirked as Rascal buried the bag of sweets under his coat.

"Shut up," he mumbled, feeling his cheeks burn from embarrassment. "You're not meant to be making fun of me, we're supposed to be helping her," he said, before adding quietly. "Not that I want to help her get with another guy."

"You'd do anything for her," Seacat said, still smirking as he watched Rascal's cheeks get redder and redder.

"I know I would," Rascal mutterd, quickly realising that Seacat was only saying this to wind him up. "Let's just get it over with though."

"Hang on, we don't even know what guy we're looking for," Seacat started, which prompted them to call over Shelley, who trudged over to them and filled them in.

* * *

Six songs later, as the choir were finishing their second rendition of 'O Come All Ye Faithful', the endeavour to set up Coral with the grey coat guy was well underway. Kiki had been recruited to help and had managed to drag out a lengthy conversation with him whilst she wrapped one of his presents painfully slowly. Seacat and Rascal had forced him back over to their sweet stall three times (but had attempted to at least four other times). And both stalls had been feeding the information back to Coral through her wingmen in the choir: Shelley, Pearl and Finn, who all kept trying to catch the boy's attention for her as well. By this point though, Coral had worked herself into an absolute state.

"Ok, so we know that he has a pet dog, he likes to play golf and he works some sort of fancy office job at his dad's recruitment agency," Shelley listed off.

"Coral, are you sure you wanna date him?" Finn asked, scrunching his nose up in distaste. He really couldn't picture his over the top, fun-loving friend with such a…boring guy.

"He's so attractive," Coral breathed, still in awe of the guy as she caught sight of him amongst the crowds again. She either hadn't heard Finn's question or didn't want to answer.

"He also has a niece that likes apple bon bons," Pearl whispered to the group, having scurried back over to them with new feedback from Seacat.

"You love apple bon bons, you can work with that," Shelley said, feeling a smile creep onto her face when she saw Coral's face light up.

"I can work with that," she agreed, repeating it to herself to try and bring back some of the confidence she normally oozed.

"Are you going to finally talk to him then?" Pearl asked.

"No, I've got to impress him first," Coral said, playing with the edge of her music folder whilst she came up with another plan.

"Just talk to him!" Finn cried, shaking her by the shoulders out of frustration.

"Me? Just talking to a guy?" Coral spluttered before breaking down laughing at the very thought.

"Yes! What's going to go wrong?"

"Talking's not my strong point," she hissed, suddenly frowning at Finn for not cooperating.

"Well you sure do a lot of it," Finn teased.

"What is your strong point then?" Pearl asked.

"Pearl, what's she been doing all night?" Shelley asked, giving the blonde a pointed look, which apparently got the message across.

"Oh my gosh, if you sing him something it'll blow him away!" Pearl cried excitedly. "He'll be yours in a heartbeat."

"She's not wrong," Shelley said. "You've noticed him, make him notice you."

"Ok, let's do this," Coral said with a sudden air of determination. And do it they did.

Coral filled the rest of the choir members in on her plan, even though they already had a rough idea of it from overhearing many of their conversations, before running over to Seacat and Rascal's stall to explain it to them.

"Ok, go for it," Seacat said with an encouraging smile.

"Wait, do I look okay?" Coral asked, catching herself before she turned away.

"What?"

"Do I look okay?" she repeated, nervously tweaking her mass of golden brown curls that had been stuffed under a slouchy, cream bobble hat. If she was going to have the 'man of her dreams' notice her then she had to look her best. Well, the best that she could at this present moment.

"You look great, doesn't she Rascal?" he said with a smirk, nudging his best friend.

"I-er- you…uh…" Rascal trailed off, clearly caught off guard. Under Coral's gaze he was blushing even harder than before.

"I'll take that as a yes," Seacat said, jumping in to save him from further embarrassment. He'd allow a little bit, but he didn't want his friend to be a total social disaster.

"Alright," Coral said, but she still looked unsure. She really needed some of her usual confidence right now.

"You'll be amazing, don't worry about anything," Rascal choked out, startling both Coral and Seacat with his outburst.

"Thanks Rascal," Coral smiled almost shyly. She seemed genuinely touched by the comment. But then her usual excitable beam returned and the moment was gone. "Okay, wish me luck!" she grinned, making her way back over to the choir, who were organising themselves for the upcoming number.

"You don't need luck," Seacat scoffed teasingly.

She just rolled her eyes at him though and took her place amongst the rest of the singers. They took a few moments to ready themselves, wish Coral luck one more time, and then they launched into their gospel-esque rendition of 'Angels We Have Heard on High'.

Coral's nerves disappeared the second she opened her mouth to sing. Her friends weren't wrong, she really did excel when it came to singing. The few opportunities she got to sing back at the beach were mainly in a group, so she couldn't really use her full voice. But here, now that she'd been given the chance she was going belt out every note that she could.

The aim of the choir's performance had been to grab the attention of the grey coat guy (who they discovered was called Evan). What they didn't realise though was that the swift change from traditional Christmas songs to an upbeat, gospel-style one was going to grab the attention of pretty much the whole fair. So when they finished, the rapturous applause came as quite a surprise.

Normally Coral would be soaking this up; she loved entertaining people but loved it even more when they showed that they loved it back. However, all she could focus on was this boy she was set on impressing. The exclamations of praise from her friends and the celebratory claps on the back she was getting weren't even being processed; all that mattered to her was this boy. She finally caught sight of him when a mother bent down to tend to her small child, and to her delight he was applauding too. They locked eye contact and shared a smile, which sent a rush of excitement flooding through Coral's body. With that excitement came a little more of her usual confidence, which propelled her to send him a little flirty wink. When she was just about to coyly tuck a strand of hair behind her ear though a girl in a berry red coat with matching lipstick and sleek, platinum blonde hair walked up behind 'grey coat guy' and pressed a kiss to his cheek. The way the girl cupped his face dumped further salt on the wound too because the engagement ring on her hand caught the light from one of the lamp posts and practically blinded Coral.

Everything she'd been building up over the course of the evening crumbled away in that one moment. She suddenly felt very overwhelmed by her own stupidity; she'd wasted all this time on someone she didn't even know all because of what? A stupid crush?

Finn was the first one to notice her crestfallen face and as soon as he followed her gaze he understood. "Hey, you deserve better than him anyway," he said, trying to console her a little bit.

"I wish," she sighed, struggling to muster a smile. She was no match for his fiancée anyway; she was tall, slender and had the complexion of a porcelain doll, not to mention facial features that belonged on the cover of every fashion magazine ever made. All Coral had was more golden curls than anyone could fathom, a tanned face overrun with freckles and a curvy, but still dumpy frame. The only place she felt she belonged right now was under her bed covers, where she could hide her embarrassment.

"Look, I know you didn't get the guy but that was still pretty unbelievable," Finn said, giving her no other option than to return his smile.

* * *

When the buzz after the performance had died down and Coral had been sufficiently comforted by her choir buddies, they had been allowed to go on a little break. And when everyone else was running off to find their friends, Coral was sitting on a bench feeling sorry for herself. She soon found that the longer she sat, the worse she felt and just when she felt tears pricking her eyes someone walked up beside her.

"This seat's not taken, is it?" Rascal asked.

"No, of course not," Coral said with a small shake of her head. But a smile broke onto her face as she was trying to get rid of any traces of her almost crying. She couldn't help but smile after Rascal had made the effort to come over to keep her company.

He perched on the bench next to her and took a second to try to pluck up the courage to say something. "You-you were really amazing," he eventually managed to say.

"Thank you," Coral said shyly, feeling her cheeks burning a little under Rascal's gaze. She knew from his tone he wasn't joking around with her like she was used to him doing, so him being this sweet was a little unusual for her. She didn't know how to react.

"And I'm sorry about what happened with Evan, I know you really liked him-"

"I thought I did," Coral said. "But I guess I just got carried away with myself. On the bright side though, he's another name I can to add to the list of crushes that weren't meant to be," she said jokingly, but her disheartened tone still crept in there. The pair sat in silence for a few seconds before Coral broke it by saying, "We will find the right people someday Rascal, I know we will."

"Yeah, of course we will," Rascal said, having to fight with himself to stay cool and not turn into a bumbling mess in front of her. The last thing he needed now was to blurt out something he'd very quickly regret.

"You seem a lot surer than I do," Coral said, managing a small laugh.

"Well we've got to stay hopeful, don't we?" Rascal said, matching her little, slightly shy laugh. "It is Christmas after all."

"I think we need a Christmas miracle more than hope," Coral chuckled.

"Or some apple bon bons," Rascal said, pulling the little bag that he'd put aside for her out of his pocket.

Coral, rather taken aback by the gesture, just stared at the sweets for a second before gently shaking herself back to reality by letting out a breathy laugh. She gratefully took one of the little green balls and held it up to Rascal. "To Christmas miracles," she smiled.

"To Christmas miracles," Rascal agreed, taking a sweet for himself and holding it up next to Coral's.

Well Coral didn't end up spending the rest of the night with her 'dream guy', but spending it sat talking to Rascal on that little bench turned out to be a pretty good alternative.

 **So…what did you think? I hope you liked it because I spent way too long on that chapter, especially since I told myself no one was going to want to read this one. It's also way too long. But I suppose that must just be because I feel most comfortable writing for Coral since she's my OC. I don't know, either way, I'm sorry about it.**

 **I know it's not the best and it's a bit dull (I may just be thinking that though because I've spent so long planning and running over the plot) but I worked hard on it. So basically I hope that you don't think that it sucked. I know not many people want to read about Coral (which is a shame for me because I have tons of plot lines for her to develop her character that no one is interested in reading) but I hope this chapter wasn't too painful for you to read if you're one of them. Let me know your opinion on me putting her in these stories though because I'm interested to hear what you have to say. Do you want more Coral? Or none at all?**

 **Also, in case you were interested, the song I mentioned in this chapter is the Glee cast's cover of Angels We Have Heard on High. I strongly recommend listening to it, not only to get the full effect of the chapter, but to just hear it in general because it's insanely good!**

 **Thank you for the reviews I got on the last chapter! Guest, thank you so much for the prompt, I may tweak it a little bit to fit but I'll still try to keep as much of it in as I can. And thank you Owllover34, I'm so glad you enjoyed it! I know I kind of suck at writing for Butchy and Giggles so the fact that you still liked it means a lot. And don't worry about the prompt; I've got one now and I can totally sympathise; I'm much better at coming up with plots for certain characters too. Plus, coming up for ideas for one-shots/short stories is super hard (I kinda hate it, not gonna lie). But I hope you managed to like this one as much as you've liked the others.**

 **I think that's all I've got to say for now though!**

 **Thank you so much for reading! Leave me a review of what you thought of the chapter! See you as soon as I can!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	7. O Lonely Night

**Hello! I'm back! And this is the chapter that the lovely Owllover34 provided the idea for, so thank you for submitting it. I have tweaked it a little bit though but I hope you don't mind too much. I hope that you enjoy it!**

On the seventh day of Christmas Lugnut got seven new family members.

* * *

Christmas hadn't been a particularly easy time for Lugnut for quite a few years now. Ever since his mom upped and left, when he and his older brother were little, it had been them and their dad. At first Lugnut didn't mind a bit; he loved his dad to pieces and his mom had only made him miserable when they were together, so now that she was out of the picture everything was fine again. Life had been jump-started; suddenly the little family of three had a whole new world of opportunities and adventures laid out in front of them (like moving to beach-side towns and learning to ride motorcycles). But just over five years ago now, Lugnut's seemingly idyllic world came crashing down on itself.

It took around a year from it being discovered for the cancer to take his dad. And if he and his brother hadn't been close before then they certainly were after going through that together. Being 18 now, Lugnut didn't know how his brother (who had been that old when they lost their dad) had the strength to look after him and keep going through the grief. He certainly didn't understand it at the time either because his father's death had torn him to shreds. Every day he spent with his friends he'd push it to the back of his mind but the second he'd get back home it'd crush him again and he'd just hole himself up in his room and cry; he felt like he couldn't do anything else.

Lugnut looked up to his dad more than anyone else when he was younger; he was a hero in his eyes, not only for rescuing them from his mom but because he did everything for his family. And that didn't change when he was ill, if anything it made Lugnut look up to him more. No matter how much he was going through treatment wise, nothing was ever more important to him than his sons and his family. And when his brother had to take over his father's role, he too began putting his family first, which made Lugnut admire and appreciate him a lot more than he ever had before. Lugnut hadn't been put in such a position where he had had to accept a role of responsibility as huge as his brother or dad had, but he knew that when the time came for him to do so he'd do everything he could to be like them.

Not many of Lugnut's friends knew about his family (or lack of), not because he was embarrassed about it but just because he never really wanted to bring it up. Plus he didn't want to just casually slip it into a conversation and become Mr Depressed in front of everyone; that wasn't the type of person he was, he didn't really like talking about himself. But the handful of people that did know were aware that events such as the Christmas fair he was currently stood in the middle of were not situations that he enjoyed attending (for a number of reasons that I'm sure you can work out).

Everywhere he seemed to look he was faced with happy families in one form or another. Giggles was stood laughing with her older sister, younger sister, mom and dad. Rascal was talking to his mom and dad about something (presumably his two older sisters judging by his slightly disgruntled facial expressions). Seacat's little brother and sister were playing some ridiculous game to try to annoy their mom and dad, who were trying to have a decent conversation with him and CheeChee (who they'd more or less taken under their wing as a daughter-in-law already; they completely adored her). Struts was happily chatting away to her mom and (almost) stepdad, who were both cooing over her two little (almost) stepbrothers. And even Lela and Butchy (who were some of the only people he felt like he could really talk to about his dad and family life considering that they had lost their mom and dad when they were young) seemed to be relatively happy because they were stood talking to Tanner and Coral, who didn't have their parents with them but were still talking about them and their plans for Christmas.

And then there was Lugnut: all alone.

His brother would gladly have been there for him but he was out of town visiting his fiancé's family, so Lugnut couldn't really begrudge him that. But not having any family with him tonight suddenly made him feel so overwhelmingly isolated. Obviously standing by himself didn't help but feeling like the only one there that evening without a family to spend it with made him feel so…lonely. It was weird and he certainly didn't like feeling that way but he just couldn't help it. Everyone there had something; even if Butchy and Lela didn't have their parents they had each other, yet there he was. He had nothing.

"Aah! There you are!""

Or so he thought.

"I've been waiting for you to show up," Struts grinned. She'd practically bowled him over when she'd run up behind him and jumped on him (which had definitely dragged Lugnut away from his thoughts) but the little giggles that slipped from her mouth as she did so made it hard for Lugnut not to be pleased to see her.

"You have?" Lugnut asked. A small, almost forced smile pulled at his lips as he spoke, which (aside from his different tone of voice) told Struts that something was wrong.

"Of course I have," she carried on, trying to push away the thought. Her good mood soon slipped further away when she came face to face with him though. Not only had he not responded to her last comment, he also wasn't even looking at her. He was intently looking at something off in the distance, yet still managed to look distracted. Something was definitely on his mind, something he didn't want to be there by the looks of it. "Lugnut, sweetie?" she said gently, snapping his attention back to her.

"Yeah?" he said, shaking his head as if to clear it of some of his thoughts.

"Is there somethin' wrong?" Struts asked, carefully smoothing down the collar of his coat.

"Uh, no," Lugnut said, stumbling over his words as he tried to make up an excuse. "Sorry, I was just, er-"

"Lugnut, there is," Struts said, knowing Lugnut well enough to realise this. She probably knew him better than Lugnut would have liked her to, but that's just Lugnut wanting to close himself off again. "What is it?" she asked, taking one of his hands in both of hers and bringing it up between them to hold.

"It's not-"

"Lugnut-"

"Struts, it's nothin', really," Lugnut mumbled, dropping his gaze from hers.

"Has somethin' happened?" Struts asked, panic beginning to edge into her voice.

'You could say that,' is what Lugnut wanted to say. But he decided it was best to hold his tongue.

"Lugnut?" Struts pushed, sounding even more worried than before.

"I'm fine," Lugnut snapped, just wanting now to forget about it.

"I only want to help," Struts said, still trying to be supportive but firmness also caught at her words now.

"I know, I'm sorry," Lugnut mumbled, instantly feeling bad for lashing out. He couldn't help it when he got down though.

"Whatever it is you're bottlin' it up again," Struts said as a slight disapproving frown creased her eyebrows and tugged on her lips.

"I'm-"

Lugnut began to protest but Struts knew she'd already won; he looked defeated before he even tried to speak. "Don't," was all she said, the firmness slipping into her voice again and bringing Lugnut's gaze back up to hers.

"Look, I can't help it, it's all I know," he mumbled, lowering his voice and his eyes again as he admitted it. "Nothin' else has ever helped me cope with things."

"Maybe because you're not coping," Struts challenged, making Lugnut stop completely. He withdrew his hand from her grip but she just put her hand on his upper arm.

"Struts don't," he said quietly, almost angrily.

"You don't ignore your bike's engine if you notice something's wrong with it, so why do you insist on ignoring your feelings when you find something wrong in your life?" Struts asked.

The couple locked their gazes for a few seconds. Struts could tell that Lugnut wanted to look back down at the floor again but she was determined to hold his attention until her words had fully sunken in.

It wasn't that Lugnut looked away intentionally; something amidst the crowds of people caught his eye that totally broke down any type of barrier he was attempting to build up between him and Struts to stop her asking anymore questions. What had drawn his attention was a man in a russet red jumper, which seems innocent enough on the surface. The fact that his father had owned (and cherished) one very similar to it though was what had distracted him.

When Struts noticed his change in disposition she knew better than to push him any further. There were times when she knew he'd only respond to firmness but there were other times (much like this one) when she saw something change in him and knew that the only way she was going to get anywhere with him was through careful coaxing.

She followed his line of sight and she too spotted the man in the red jumper. At first she didn't understand what significance it had, so she just gave his arm a gentle squeeze to remind him that she was there for him.

"Sorry," Lugnut sighed quietly, shaking his head a little again as he brought himself back to reality. "It just…reminded me of my dad," he admitted, seeming uncomfortable about saying that out loud.

Suddenly everything became glaringly obvious for Struts. "Oh Lugnut, I'm sorry."

"It's fine," he said, trying to brush off the gloomy atmosphere that had descended over them both by mustering a smile.

"Is that what was bothering you?" Struts asked, her eyebrows knitting together as clear concern laced her voice.

"Sometimes just bein' around other families does," Lugnut admitted. "It's like the world's tryin' to rub it in that everyone else has a family and I don't." His short, forced laughs did little to lighten what he was saying and they certainly didn't change Struts' expression.

"Lugnut," she said, reaching up to cup his cheek. "You know that's not true."

"It feels like it is though," he said miserably, his attempts to be cheery failing him this time.

Struts took a second to take in everything that Lugnut was saying, but as she did so a smile crept onto her face and a plan formed in her head. "Come with me," she said quietly to him.

As soon as Lugnut saw the little sparkle in her eye he knew that she plotting something, something he felt he wouldn't want to go through with. All he really wanted to do was have a little more time with his thoughts. But considering that Struts knew that didn't do him any good, he had a feeling that she had something much different in store.

"Having Nick here would really have helped with this," she muttered to herself as she led a reluctant Lugnut through the crowds of people. She soon stopped a few feet away from where Lela and Butchy stood with a laughing Tanner and Coral and then turned to him. "You have told me on many occasions that Butchy is more of a brother to you than a friend. Correct?"

"Struts, what does this-?" Lugnut began, more than a little confused by his girlfriend's actions.

"Correct?" she repeated, not moving on until she was given an answer.

"Correct," Lugnut mumbled, not seeing a point in what Struts was doing. But then again, he didn't know what she was doing yet.

"Good. And do you or do you not say that you feel like a second big brother to Lela?" Struts continued, a triumphant smile starting to edge onto her face when she saw that Lugnut was beginning to understand what was going on.

"I do," he said, having to fight the urge to smile when he saw one break across Struts' face.

"So there you go, you've got a family right here. They may not _technically_ be your family, but they feel like one. And that's close enough, right?"

But Lugnut just shot her a sideway glance and an ever so slightly amused smile, which wasn't enough for Struts.

"Well then, let me show you something else," she said, taking his hand again and weaving him through even more crowds. This time she stopped a few paces away from where her little family stood before turning to Lugnut. "When- if we get married," she began, catching herself halfway through what she was saying and beginning to furiously blush. "By law, we will become your family," she carried on, trying to play off her earlier comment and gesturing to her family as she spoke. "But there's nothing to say that we can't be like one now."

"Struts-"

"You saw my mom the other night, she loves you. I know your own mom might not be there for you, but I know that my mom is. And Will, and Joey and Jackson all are too," she continued, ignoring Lugnut's attempt to stop her. "We're all here for you Lugnut; you're part of our family too."

This time when Lugnut brought himself to look at Struts a smile was etched onto his face, and it was all down to her.

"So let's see," she began, before starting to count with her fingers. "You have Butchy, Lela, my mom, Will, Joey, Jackson and me. That's seven family members," she grinned, wiggling the seven fingers she'd put up in front of his face. "That's more than a lot of people here have."

"What about Nick?" Lugnut challenged jokingly, bringing up his older brother.

"Ssh, Nick doesn't count, he's not here right now," Struts said, playfully pressing a finger to her lips as Lugnut let out a proper laugh. "Look," she said, settling into a slightly more serious tone (although she still wore a smile on her face). "I know that I didn't get to meet your dad, but I can tell that he was a wonderful man from the way that you've turned out."

"Thanks Struts," Lugnut said, feeling his chest warming with pride.

"He'd be so proud of you Lugnut. And whatever you may think, he's always with you, remember that next time you feel like you did tonight," Struts said, feeling her smile getting even wider as she watched Lugnut process her words.

Even though he only replied with a small nod she could tell that what she'd said had meant a lot to him. The soft kiss he pressed to her lips shortly after though certainly helped to show his gratitude, and Struts certainly didn't mind him showing it that way. She was just happy to have helped him; the kiss was a bonus.

 **So…what did you think?**

 **I'm sorry if it sucked, I got carried away again and I feel like (because I was rushing to get it done) it got progressively worse…But let me know what you thought of it!**

 **Thank you so much Guest for your review on the last chapter! I'm super happy that you don't mind Coral because I've been really panicking about putting her into my stories and people hating them because of it, so thank you for letting me know. And I'm not even kidding, that fact that you said you're starting to ship her with Rascal almost made me cry because ever since I created her 3 years ago I've been waiting for someone to ship her with someone. That's probably the saddest thing you've ever read but I don't really care, it's true! So thank you for that!**

 **And Owllover34, I'm sorry that I kind of tweaked some of your headcanons (which I absolutely love reading so thank you for leaving them in your review) for this chapter but I hope that you still liked it! I hope I didn't ruin your idea for you!**

 **I think that's all I have to say for now though. Thank you for reading! I'll be back as soon as I get the next chapter finished. Don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	8. Ring-le Bells

**Haha, writing a whole 2,000+ word chapter in an evening...how fun. Let's see how this goes.**

On the eighth day of Christmas Tanner got 8 kisses in one hour...at least.

* * *

The Wet Side Story characters had barely had time to recover from the Christmas fair when their annual Christmas party at Big Momma's rolled around. A full five hours of exchanging gifts, dancing to Christmas songs, watching (usually improvised) performances from their friends and stuffing themselves silly with food was definitely a highlight of the Christmas season for everyone that attended. Plus it was like a last hurrah for them all before they went away to spend Christmas with their families, so no one ever wanted to miss it.

That night was no exception; even though the party wasn't supposed to officially start for another five minutes Big Momma's already seemed pretty full of life. The dancefloor was already filling with people and the Christmas tree that was tucked in one corner of it was already swamped by presents, but another one was trying to be added to the mass.

Tanner had been stood there for absolutely ages, he'd lost count of how long it actually was because his only focus was solely set on getting Lela's stupid present box to stay balanced on one of the tree branches.

"Tanner, give it a rest, it's never going to stay, is it?" Coral said, rolling her eyes as her brother reached to grab the box as it began to topple of the branch again.

"Shut up Coral, I got it to work on the tree at home," Tanner said, ever so slightly sticking his tongue out as he tried yet again to steady the little box..

"Just put it with the others," Seacat said to him, walking up behind Coral with a bag of candy canes in his hand. "You know, on the ground," he added as he offered the bag to her.

"What's special about that?" Tanner asked.

"You do know that Lela's already your girlfriend, right?" Coral asked before starting to suck on her candy cane. "You don't need to keep impressing her."

"It's not to impress her, I just want to make her feel special," Tanner said, tweaking the box so delicately that he might as well have not been touching it at all.

"Don't we all," Seacat mumbled sarcastically.

"Isn't a lead movie role enough to make her feel special?" Coral asked, clearly bitter about the whole situation considering that it was her dream to be an actress.

"You know what, green really does suit you Coral," Tanner said, doing remarkably well not to let his sarcasm show in his voice.

"I'm not wearing green," Coral said, looking down at her ice blue jumper, which had a big white snowflake sprawled cross it, in confusion.

"Really? I'd check again," Tanner said, once again managing to keep a straight face. But then penny dropped for Coral, which soon turned her face to thunder and prompted Seacat to start laughing.

"Shut up Tanner," she grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest in annoyance.

"Shut up Coral," he shot back, finally letting a smile crawl onto his face for that small triumph. After all, it was the only thing that had actually gone successfully for him today.

"Wow, isn't it fun being twins?" Seacat said sarcastically before starting to laugh again when Coral rolled her eyes at him.

"Hey," Tanner said, taking a step back from the tree with his hands in the air. "Look, it's staying!" he exclaimed. He hadn't been this excited about something for a long time (excluding the moment when he discovered that afternoon that Giggles was bringing some of her homemade white chocolate peppermint bark to the party). But he was still completely ecstatic about this considering he'd put so much effort into propping it up there.

"Hey, well done, dude," Seacat said, actually quite impressed.

"You know what, it does look quite-" Coral began, realising now (once it was in place) why Tanner had insisted on putting the little white box there.

But she was cut off by a handful of Rodents bounding through the restaurant's door, all talking as loudly as their engines roared. The sheer force of their footsteps practically shook the restaurant, but it still came as a shock to the trio when the ruckus caused the precariously balanced box to tumble off its perch.

"No!" Tanner cried, diving to catch it. But it was too late; the box had tumbled between the branches and had well and truly disappeared.

Coral and Seacat looked at each other, pulled a definite 'yikes' face and then silently agreed between them that they should probably go, which was later confirmed by them scurrying off with the bag of candy canes between them.

Tanner tried to peer through the branches of the Christmas tree without disrupting the decorations too much but it was no use, he couldn't see the little box at all. In the end he felt he had no other choice than to stick his arm amongst the pine needles to see if he could find the box that way. He had to find it; if he didn't then Lela wouldn't have a present at all.

Speaking of Lela…

"Uh…Hi Tanner!" she greeted, more than a little puzzled by the scene she was faced with.

"Oh, hi Lela," Tanner said, plastering a bright smile across his face to try to play everything off cool and distract her from the fact that it looked like he was being swallowed by the Christmas tree. "Have you had a nice day?"

"Yes? And you?" she asked, still looking at Tanner like he was ever so slightly insane.

"Yeah, I've been good," he said, trying to lean against the tree in a bid to get the whole thing to feel a little more normal (which was kind of impossible at this point). But this only made things worse because the added weight to the tree almost sent it toppling over.

"Ok, I can't not ask you this now: what on earth are you doing?" Lela asked, helping Tanner steady himself (and the tree).

"Just…checking the tree," Tanner lied (horribly).

"Uh huh," Lela nodded slowly, clearly not buying a word of what he was saying. "Now do you want to tell me what you're really doing?" she asked again, looking at him like a little child she was about to tell off for disobeying her.

"I'm looking for your present," Tanner confessed, flashing her a smile in the hope that that would make her come around a bit.

"Why are you looking in the tree?" Lela asked, letting out a little amused chuckle.

"I put it there," Tanner said, like it was the most obvious option.

"You put my present in the tree?" Lela asked, bringing back the look that told Tanner that she thought he was crazy.

"On the tree," Tanner corrected.

"But now it's in the tree," Lela said, having gathered that much from the conversation so far.

"Yeah," Tanner grinned. "But I don't know where in the tree."

"Why not?"

"It fell between the branches and now I can't see it."

"Oh Tanner," Lela sighed, fondly shaking her head at him before walking over to peer between the branches herself. Sometimes words failed her when Tanner faced her with situations like this.

"This is what I get for trying to make it special for you," Tanner sighed, going back to rummaging around between the branches.

"I don't know, I'd say this is pretty special," Lela teased, making Tanner crack a smile.

* * *

The couple spent a good ten minutes searching for the gift but were eventually moved along by some of the surfers who were wanting to start handing out the Secret Santa presents.

"I'm sorry Lela, I really don't know where it went," Tanner said dejectedly. He felt terrible; he'd gone through all the fuss of setting up the present and now he didn't even have a present to give her at all.

"Don't worry, I'm sure we'll find it at some point," Lela said, smiling sweetly at him and resting a reassuring hand on his knee.

"It won't be the same though," Tanner mumbled. It seemed to be bothering him a whole lot more than it was bothering Lela, she seemed completely fine with it.

"Hey, it'll have come from you and that alone is enough to make me love it," Lela grinned.

"I just wanted you to have something to open today," Tanner said, trying to muster a smile back.

"I do have something to open," Lela giggled, picking up and spinning the flat, red and white striped box she had had placed in her lap. At least her Secret Santa had pulled through.

The other teens in the restaurant were all sat around various tables chattering and opening their own Secret Santa presents. Those that had already opened theirs were parading around with them to either show them off or mess around with them. An example of the latter was Seacat blowing up CheeChee's inflatable crown for her and then balancing it on top of her beehive so that she could perform in her own little fashion show for her friends.

But when it came to Lugnut opening up his present (which had been placed in a gift bag with a big robin on it) the smile dropped off his face.

"What's wrong?" Struts asked. She stopped playing with the bright pink hair rollers she had received from her Secret Santa as soon as she saw his expression change.

"Uh, I don't think someone knew about the $10 budget," he said, pulling a little white box with a pale pink bow on top of it out of the bag. "And has a crush on me," he added once he realised that it was a ring box.

"Hey Tanner, isn't that-?" Seacat started, looking over at Lugnut to see what the fuss was about and recognising the present box.

"There it is!" Tanner exclaimed, instantly being able to identify the box after spending so long looking at it when he was trying to set it up. "It must have fallen into your bag, Lugnut."

"Uh, here you go then," Lugnut said, awkwardly handing the box across to Tanner before delving back into the bag to find his actual gift, which turned out to be a toothbrush shaped like a wrench.

"Well this has kind of ruined the moment," Tanner awkwardly laughed, toying with the box in his hand for a second.

"Not at all," Lela chuckled.

"Er, Merry Christmas Lela," he said, finally finding his smile again as he handed her the box.

"Thank you," Lela said, feeling a shy blush creeping onto her cheeks as she shifted the bow and opened the box. Inside was a pale pink pearl, very similar to the colour of the bow that had adorned the box, sat inside a simple silver setting atop a twisted, silver band. At first the modest beauty of the ring was all that filled Lela's thoughts, but it slowly dawned on her that this could symbolise something a lot more. Tanner had certainly seemed flustered when he couldn't find it earlier and he looked absolutely devastated when he thought that he couldn't give it to her. Plus he'd been kind of antsy all day. And it was a ring so...

"Tanner, it's beautiful," she initially breathed, before biting the bullet and saying. "But is this-"

Suddenly Tanner realised how all of this must look. All of the fuss he'd made earlier about making it perfect for her, the panic that ensued when he lost it and now the revelation that it was a ring...Tanner could practically feel Butchy's hard gaze drilling holes into the back of his head and Coral's gaping mouth and horrified expression (which he'd spotted from the corner of his eye) told him all he needed to know.

"It's not an engagement ring," he blurted, welling up with embarrassment once the initial alarm had disappeared. Everyone that had been watching them as Lela opened the present (clearly waiting for the supposedly imminent proposal) lost interest and went back to their own presents after that, which took a little bit of the pressure off Tanner. But he still had Lela, half-disappointed, half-relieved, to deal with. "I'm sorry, I see now that it looked a lot like-"

"What are you saying sorry for?" Lela asked in disbelief. She still hadn't worked out how to wipe the smile off her face, it felt like it would have to stay there permanently now.

"You seemed disappointed," Tanner said sheepishly.

"About what? It's still beautiful," Lela gushed, lifting the ring out of the box and holding it between her fingers.

"So you still like it?" Tanner checked, still seemingly unsure.

"Of course I do! I love it," she enthused, leaning across to kiss him. "You couldn't have picked a more perfect colour either; I love pink," she added with a giggle once they'd separated.

"Well pink pearls represent love, happiness and kindness, and that's everything I think you represent so I thought that it was kind of meant to be," Tanner smiled, relieved now that the present had been well received.

"Tanner, that's so thoughtful."

"It may not be an engagement ring," Tanner started, taking the ring from her and holding her hand in his. "But let's say it's a promise ring."

"A promise ring?" Lela asked, apparently a stranger to the idea. But Tanner slipped the ring onto her finger anyway. "What are we promising?"

"Well I'm promising to love you until the day I die," Tanner said, a little casually considering the weight of the comment. "Or something along those lines," he then chuckled after Lela's eyes had grown to the size of dinner plates for the second time that evening.

"I like that promise," Lela smiled as she felt her cheeks burning ever so slightly under Tanner's smouldering gaze. "I love you Tanner," she said, leaning in to give him another kiss.

"I love you too," Tanner replied, returning the favour with yet another smooch.

The pair were so overwhelmed with newfound love for each other after this little moment that they just kept sneaking kisses from one another at any given opportunity they had, which was only encouraged when Pearl started running around with a rogue mistletoe branch that they just kept happening to get caught under. I think that it was safe to say that despite its rocky entrance, Tanner's gift to Lela went down a treat.

 **So...what did you think? I apologise if it sucked but it is my second chapter of the day so I don't think you could have expected anything very good (not that my chapters ever are). But I thought the idea was cute, so I hope you did too!**

 **I don't really have anything to say here; I kind of said everything else for today in the last chapter. So I guess all I have to say really is: thank you for reading! I'll see you next chapter! Don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	9. Secret Santa Claus is Coming to Town

**Hello! It's me again with another chapter (these are slowly killing me but I'm not giving up yet)! Enjoy!**

On the ninth day of Christmas Rascal got nine (hundred) butterflies in his stomach.

* * *

To be honest, Rascal couldn't deny his disappointment when he opened his Secret Santa gift. To have put all of the effort he had into his and then receive a wall hook shaped like a flamingo (which he knew was either from Reef or Finn because it was a clear reference to the infamous 'pink bird incident') was kind of like a slap to the face.

Coral on the other hand had expected (and kind of looked forward to) getting a jokey Secret Santa present for her to laugh about. So when she untied the white bow and lifted the lid off the relatively flat rectangular box she was floored. Inside the box, after peeling back a layer of white tissue paper, lay three pieces of paper. Three pieces of manuscript paper. Not only was it manuscript paper, it was manuscript paper scattered with little black dots and hand written words...her Secret Santa had written her a song. At first she was in too much shock to actually really do anything, but she managed to drive her hand forwards to pick up the little square card that had been placed on top of the pile of papers. And as she read (and re-read) the words she only got more overwhelmed.

 _'Sorry, this may not be worth $10, but it is worth a lot of my time. Merry Christmas - Secret Santa'_

Coral couldn't stop reading the card, let alone the music itself. The first thing she was drawn to was the melody of the song but when started trying to quietly hum it to herself, she was instantly distracted when she noticed the little handwritten lyrics that had been paired with it. And that's when she started crying.

Now Coral was never one who enjoyed crying in front of people. She may have been an emotional wreck but she liked to keep that as a little secret (even though a lot of the time it didn't work out like that). When she started reading these lyrics that her Secret Santa had written for her though there was nothing that she could do to stop the tears working their way down her cheeks. She was just so stunned that someone that she knew had gone through all this effort for her and had produced something so beautiful for _her_. No, the song wasn't an intricate symphony for a 50 piece orchestra, but the notion behind it alone was enough to make it the most beautiful piece of music that she had ever laid eyes on.

As the excitement of the Secret Santa gift-giving died down the group of teens started to drift off and spread out around the restaurant a little more. The excitement may have been over but Coral still hadn't put her gift down and Rascal hadn't stopped sneaking glances at her.

"Hey, I think she liked it," Seacat smirked as he flopped down in the seat next to Rascal. The two friends both glanced across at Coral again, who was getting horribly teased by Reef and her brother for crying (even though she'd managed to compose herself a little more now).

"Are you saying that sarcastically or are you being serious?" Rascal asked, still so nervous that he couldn't even think about distinguishing the comment from a joke and the truth.

"Are you kidding me dude? You haven't been able to keep your eyes off her so I know you saw her reaction," Seacat said. "And if you can't tell how much she likes it after that then I seriously think you need professional help."

All Rascal could do was smile now that it had been confirmed.

"The real question is: why haven't you swooped in and rightfully take credit as the composer?" Seacat asked, shooting the besotted surfer a pointed look.

"Because she doesn't know it's from me," Rascal said, his gaze still fixed on the undeniable smile hidden beneath the sea of golden curls.

"What?" Seacat said, suddenly snapping to attention and sending Rascal a look that told him he thought that he was insane. "I thought you were putting in the apple bon bons you had left over from the other night."

"I chickened out last night," Rascal sighed dejectedly.

"First you refuse to sign your name on the sheet music and now you refuse to give her any indication that it was from you," Seacat said. He was in a state of complete disbelief.

"Yeah."

"You're such an idiot, did you know that?"

"No, thanks for reminding me," Rascal said sarcastically, resting his chin on his hand and shooting him a sideways glance.

"Why didn't you even give her a hint that it was from you?!" Seacat hissed.

"I don't know," Rascal admitted, feeling a pang of regret shoot through him.

"Dude, you went through all that effort for her and she doesn't have a clue about it," Seacat said. Even he was finding this difficult to accept, so he had no idea how Rascal must be feeling.

As soon as Rascal had found out that he had picked Coral for Secret Santa he'd wracked his brain for days until he felt he had come up with something special enough for her. He knew how much she adored music so naturally something musical was bound to go down well, and what was more musical than a song? So that was decided: he'd write her a song. The only problem was that Rascal had no idea how to read music, let alone write a piece of it. Rascal had then decided to confide in Seacat, who instantly set him on the right track by teaching him not only how to read music, but how to play the piano and had then given any input he could into helping him write the song. And after weeks of Rascal slamming his hands down on the piano keys in frustration and tossing failed melodies into his trashcan until it overflowed, he finally had a finished song for her. It wasn't as spectacular as he felt she deserved, but it had come from his heart and he couldn't really offer her any more.

"Well...at least she's happy with it," Rascal said gloomily.

"Rascal I didn't rig the Secret Santa for you to just stand by and watch-"

"You rigged it?!" Rascal hissed, staring at Seacat in wide-eyed disbelief.

"...Yeah," he said, a little shocked at how horrified Rascal looked.

"Why?!"

"Because then you could give her a great present that would set you up for some flirting," Seacat said, explaining it as if the plan had been obvious.

"I can't flirt with her!" Rascal cried, trying his best to keep his voice down but still managing to show how much he was freaking out. He seemed genuinely terrified at the very thought of it.

"Why not?" Seacat asked. "You've already given her the present, now all you have to do is slip in a hint that it was from you and she'll be sobbing tears of joy in the palm of your hand."

"I can't do that," Rascal said. He'd rather dump his head in the cheese fondue bowl than attempt to flirt with Coral and make a fool of himself in front of her.

"Why not? What's the worst that could happen?" Seacat asked. But as soon as he took a look at Rascal he knew exactly what his friend was scared of. "Do you seriously think she'd reject you?"

"No, I think she'd try to let me down easily," Rascal mumbled unhappily. "Which would be worse."

"Rascal, there's nothing for her not to like about you," Seacat said, trying to give him a little pep talk. "Look, I know we all tease you sometimes but what you did for Coral tonight proved that you're a better guy than a lot of people here tonight." And when Rascal still seemed insecure, Seacat continued. "Rascal, where's your confidence? You've gotta believe in yourself. I know you may think that Coral's some type of goddess but she's no difference than you are, there's no reason for her to turn you down."

"I don't know Seacat," Rascal sighed, his self-confidence still at pretty much all time low.

"Look, just go and ask her to dance, that's pretty normal for you two, then you can take it from there," Seacat said.

"Really? You think that'll work?" Rascal asked. Even though this sounded a little more his speed, he still remained a little unsure.

"You'll never know if you don't try," Seacat said as a smile crept onto his face after sneaking a quick glance at Coral. "And you'd better find your dancing shoes because I think someone's already made your decision for you," he said, giving him an encouraging clap on the back and then getting up to leave the table..

Rascal was just a little bewildered by Seacat's actions but it all became glaringly obvious when Coral strolled up to him wearing a big grin (and tear tracks in her makeup). A deep blush immediately rose on his cheeks when he saw her and it felt like 900 butterflies had been released in his stomach.

"Hey, what are you doing sat over here when your favourite Christmas song's playing?" she chuckled, offering her hand to him to help him up.

"I was just...talking," Rascal awkwardly laughing, trying desperately to relax a little bit.

"I didn't interrupt did I?" Coral asked worriedly.

"No," Rascal said with a fond smile but a gentle shake of his head. "In fact we'd just finished."

"Perfect," she grinned, leading him towards the other dancing couples. "Now, let's show all these couples that single people know how to have fun too," she chuckled.

As much as Rascal wanted Coral to understand his feelings for her, just getting to spend time with her like this was enough to keep him happy. He was just glad that his gift for her had gone down well; all he'd ever wanted was to make her smile and he'd certainly accomplished that. It may not have been the Christmas miracle he had wished for, but seeing her this happy wasn't too far from it.

 **So...what did you think? It might not be perfect because I haven't had the chance to check back over it but hopefully it's not atrocious.**

 **Aww, isn't Rascal sweet though? I was trying to come up with a meaningful gift for him to get Coral for ages but this idea finally came to me last night when I was listening to Your Song by Elton John (which I imagine was the song that he wrote for her). So I hope that you like it because I was pretty pleased with this idea (the execution of it is another story though...).**

 **Thank you Guest for the review you left on my last chapter, I'm so pleased that you thought it was well written (especially after I'd panicked about it sucking because I'd written the whole thing in an evening). And I'm pleased that you left me some feedback like that; it's really boosted my confidence. So thank you! I hope you liked this chapter too!**

 **Again, I think that's all I have to say for now. So thank you for reading! I'll see you in the next chapter! Don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	10. Feliz Navi-Dab Your Pants Dry

**Hello! I'm back again with another chapter that I wrote in an evening. Let's see how I did this time?**

On the tenth day of Christmas CheeChee got ten wet napkins stuffed down her top.

* * *

CheeChee insisted on wearing her little blow-up princess crown on her head all night, which proved to be a lot easier said than done considering that she spent most of her time dancing. In fact, she'd spent so long dancing that her feet were starting to kill her. It probably hadn't helped that she'd chosen to wear her boots with skyscraper heels, but she had never been the kind of girl to value function over fashion.

"Do you have any other shoes with you, CheeChee?" Giggles asked her after noticing the way that she had hobbled over to the snack table.

"Huh?"

"Di you bring any other shoes?" Giggles repeated.

"No but I wish I did; these blisters are killin' me," CheeChee said, wincing as she leant against the table.

"I told you not to wear those boots," Seacat said from beside her as he loaded his plate with mozzarella sticks.

"You're just made 'cause I'm almost as tall as ya," CheeChee snapped before letting out one of her signature giggles when Seacat rolled his eyes at her.

"You're so wobbly when you're wearing them that I could knock you over with my little finger," he chuckled.

"Says who?" CheeChee demanded as if the idea was preposterous. But she still yelped when Seacat pretended to bump into her.

"I have nothing more to say," Seacat grinned smugly before letting out a chuckle and popping one of the mozzarella sticks into his mouth.

"I'll get ya back for that," CheeChee said, pointing a warning finger at him.

"Maybe, but for now, as a reward, I get to wear the crown," Seacat said, smoothly lifting it off CheeChee's head and placing it on his own.

CheeChee tried to reach to grab it back but, thanks to her heels, all she ended up doing was stumbling forwards, straight into Seacat's free arm.

"That's two points to me, zero points to you," he smirked before setting her back on her feet.

"Is it your job to wind me up or somethin?'" CheeChee asked, but she always struggled to get mad at him.

"Hmm, I'd say it's more of a hobby," he joked before quickly pecking her cheek, setting the crown back on top of her beehive and walking off to talk to Giggles.

"Hey CheeChee, if you're still looking for some flat shoes then Polly said that she's got some in her bag," Kiki piped up, having overheard the biker girl's conversation from before.

"Oh, thanks," CheeChee said, a little taken aback by the sudden offer since she was just pouring herself a drink from the punch bowl.

"It's in the cloakroom at the back, just look for the pink backpack," Kiki smiled. "I think you're both the same size but surely anything's better than wearing those any longer," she added.

"Uh, yeah, I guess," CheeChee replied, shooting her a grateful, yet still kind of forced, smile.

So suddenly CheeChee found herself limping down the back corridor of Big Momma's, checking each door until she found this cloakroom. And, when she did eventually find it, just as Kiki had promised, there hung the little pink backpack. Before she knew it CheeChee was stepping back into the hallway with a relieved smile on her face, pristine yellow sneakers adorning her feet and her glass of fruit punch in her hand. She may be about 6 inches shorter than when she'd walked into that room but certainly felt a lot comfier.

As she made her way back down the twisting corridor to the main area of the restaurant she began happily humming Jingle Bells to herself. She was so lost in her own thoughts as she hummed that she didn't notice Butchy walking towards her until it was too late and she'd completely collided with him.

They both stumbled back a step or two in shock before CheeChee instinctively shrieked: "Butchy!"

"What?"

"What are you doing?!" she cried.

"What am I doing? Yous is the one that walked into me," Butchy said, looking down at his clothes in dismay. "All I wanted to do was go to the bathroom."

But only when Butchy looked down at his clothes did CheeChee realise what she'd done. When they'd bumped into each other the glass of fruit punch had toppled over in her hand and had completely drenched him. There was quite a substantial amount on his t-shirt but his jeans had taken the bulk of the blow and were more or less completely soaked.

"Oh jeez Butch, look what you've made me do now," she snapped.

"Me?!"

She was in a foul mood all over again. Heaving out a sigh she grabbed Butchy by the hand and dragged him back out into the party. "You can't go around lookin' like this," she huffed angrily as she snatched a fistful of napkins off the corner of the buffet table.

"Yous don't think I know that?" Butchy bit back. In situations like this, when CheeChee and Butchy were both annoyed, they just made each other worse. They were both so volatile that anything could set them both off and then the fact that the other one was ticked off would infuriate them even more.

"Here," CheeChee barked, forcing some of the napkins into Butchy's hand.

"Chee, you're makin' out this is my fault," Butchy began as CheeChee started trying to soak up some of the liquid with the napkins.

"Well if you hadn't walked into me then-"

"Yous is the one that walked into me!" Butchy cried.

"You could have moved!" CheeChee hissed back, starting to dab at the stain more vigorously.

Quiet fell over the pair after that, which left them both to fume in silence as they tried to wipe down the stain. But the longer CheeChee stood there rubbing Butchy's pants, the weirder it felt for both of them.

"I bet this looks great without context," Butchy said sarcastically, breaking the silence.

"Oh shut up Butchy," CheeChee muttered, instantly feeling her cheeks start to burn.

"Well, well, well CheeChee," Seacat chuckled as he walked up behind her.

Butchy just awkwardly glanced at CheeChee, who was wide-eyed and frozen in place after hearing the sound of her boyfriend's voice. In a blind panic she tried to get rid of the napkins, but when she couldn't find anywhere to put them the only thing that she could think of doing was stuffing them down her top in a bid to hide them. Totally normal, I know. But you can't blame her, she was put on the spot.

"Do you two want some space?" Seacat continued to joke as he came to a halt just behind CheeChee.

"Why are you jealous?" she quipped, trying to hide the fact that she was furiously blushing by laying on the sarcasm. After all that fuss she'd gone through to try to hide the napkins he wasn't even bothered.

"Nah, not really," Seacat teased, making CheeChee turn around just to scowl at him.

"You ain't funny," she huffed. But what she didn't realise was now Seacat could see all the napkins that she'd shoved down her top.

Seacat had to bite his cheek to stop himself bursting out laughing as soon as he saw what CheeChee had done. "You, er, trying to pad yourself out a little, Chee?" he asked, reaching to pull out one of the partially damp pieces of paper towel.

"Seacat!" CheeChee hissed, shocked at how casually he'd just done that.

"What? I'm your boyfriend, I'm allowed," he laughed easily.

"You're goin' straight on the naughty list," she scolded, grabbing the napkin back out of his hand.

"You don't think I'm already on it?" Seacat joked.

"You've got a reserved spot," CheeChee huffed.

"Oh that was a good one," Seacat said, genuinely impressed by her little dig. "You're getting the hang of this."

"What? Being an idiot?" CheeChee asked, sending him a false smile.

"Well, acting like one," Seacat compromised.

"It's 'cause I spend so much time with you, you're rubbin' off on me," she sighed, trying to remove some of the napkins herself.

"Fine, I'll let you spend some time by yourself," Seacat said, flashing her a smirk before grabbing a mini quiche from the snack table and walking away again.

CheeChee stood shaking her head for a few seconds before realising that Butchy was still stood behind her (and he'd probably heard all of that). "Take these," she muttered, shoving the bundle of napkins she had into his arms before going to follow Seacat.

Seacat's smirk hadn't left his face; it was still there when CheeChee fell into stride beside him. "Oh, you're back so soon," Seacat teased, mocking surprise.

"I couldn't stay away," CheeChee said sarcastically.

"How could anyone? I'm irresistible," Seacat smirked, only half joking.

"You know what's most annoying about what you just said?" CheeChee said, feeling a smile threatening to break onto her face no matter how hard she tried to fight against it.

"What?" Seacat chuckled.

"I know that part of you is being serious," she said, only making Seacat laugh more. Upon hearing this CheeChee dared to glance across at him, but the sight of him laughing made her fight to stop smiling impossible to win.

"How is it you know me this well already?" he asked. "It's like we're married."

"We sure do argue like we are," CheeChee snorted. She couldn't help it, the giggle had slipped out against her will.

"Oh come on, we don't argue," Seacat said, shooting her a sideways smile.

"We bicker," she corrected, warping his smile into a smirk.

"And we do it because we love each other," Seacat said.

"You're so cheesy," CheeChee said, trying her hardest to frown, which wasn't easy when she was faced with Seacat, who was grinning like the idiot he was.

"I have had about eight mozzarella sticks tonight," he said, which set CheeChee off giggling properly this time.

Yes they may poke fun at each other a lot, but that's just how they worked. Besides, they always made up eventually. And to be honest, no matter how much they may complain in the moment, neither one of them would have it any other way.

 **So...what did you think? I hope that you liked it! Yet again I haven't had the chance to check over this chapter so I'm sorry if there's a few mistakes, I have been writing this in a rush so I can't promise anything close to perfection.**

 **I know this chapter's a little silly but I thought the idea was kind of cute, let me know what you thought of it though! I will admit I strayed a little from the original idea I had for it but I couldn't help it; I just got carried away again because I love CheeChee and Seacat so much. XD**

 **Anyway, since this is my second chapter of the day I haven't had any reviews yet. So I don't really have anything else to say here apart from: thank you for reading! I'll see you tomorrow for the final two chapters (I hope!). Don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


	11. Tis The Season to Be Unlucky

**Hello! Happy Christmas Eve! I'm back with another chapter that I can't believe I've managed to write. Let's see how this one's turned out...**

On the eleventh day of Christmas Butchy got eleven girls to fawn over him.

* * *

"I can't believe we're not spending Christmas together," Lela said. "It's going to be so weird."

"Hey, wes is havin' our own Christmas morning tomorrow before we leave, so it ain't really that weird," Butchy said, still trying to dry the stain that sprawled across his t-shirt; he'd given up on his jeans.

"I suppose," Lela said, mustering a smile. "At least we won't be fighting over the turkey this year."

"Yeah," Butchy chuckled. "I'm still gonna eat so much turkey I fall asleep at the table though."

"Giggles doesn't know what she's getting herself into," Lela laughed.

And right on cue...

"Oh Butchy, what have you done now?" Giggles sighed, strolling past and catching a glimpse of his soiled t-shirt.

"Why does everyone think this is my fault?!" Butchy cried, which just made Lela laugh more.

"Hey, I'll see you later," she said, turning to her brother before walking off to go and catch up with Struts and some of her fellow Rodents girls.

"See ya Lela," Butchy said, smiling fondly at his little sister as she left but even more fondly at Giggles when she took her place.

"Whose fault is it then?" Giggles asked, gladly returning his grin.

"CheeChee's," Butchy grumbled, wadding up the napkins he was using ad dumping them on a nearby, unoccupied table.

"Well I'm sure she didn't mean it," Giggles said.

"She didn't," Butchy sighed.

"Then there's no need to be grumpy about it, is there?" Giggles beamed, making Butchy chuckle. Sometimes he was baffled by the amount of positivity she had. "Come on," she continued, getting to her face and prompting Butchy to do the same. "Let's go and get you cleaned up properly."

"What?"

"Well you can't stay in that for the rest of the party," Giggles elaborated. "Your house isn't far, we'll just get you home so you can change and then we'll come right back."

"It's not that big of a deal, G," Butchy said, clearly not wanting to put Giggles out of her way.

"Don't be silly, we'll be back in like twenty minutes at most," Giggles grinned, taking him by the hand and leading him towards the door.

"Fine," Butchy sighed as a he allowed himself to be escorted outside and for a smile to twist at his lips.

No sooner had they gotten outside though, they heard a commotion as they approached the car park.

"Finn? Shelley? What are you guys doing?" Giggles asked after noticing her two friends amongst the group of people crowding around one of the cars.

"Finn locked his keys, and my present, inside his car," Shelley said, shooting the boy in question an accusing look.

"Well done," Butchy mumbled sarcastically, earning a light shove in the ribs from Giggles.

"Have you called someone who can fix it?" Giggles asked them, slowly walking towards them and therefore leading Butchy with her.

"Pearl tried but they said that they couldn't send anyone out until tomorrow morning," Shelley huffed.

"I think I left my house keys in there as well," Finn confessed, patting down his shorts to try to find them but coming to no avail.

"Oh for God's sake Finn," Shelley fumed, even more annoyed with him than before (if that was even possible).

"Yep, there they are," Finn sighed dejectedly, pressing his face up against the car's window and spotting the keys. "Looks like I'm sleeping at yours tonight then Shell," he said, trying to lighten the mood by joking around.

"You're sleeping on the couch," Shelley said pointedly. "Or the floor, or in the garden."

"Shell," Finn whined. "Please."

"We'll see how I feel later," Shelley said, succeeding in fighting her urge to smile.

"Look, can't you get into it some other way?" Summer asked, yanking at the door handle of one of the back doors.

"It's locked Summer, what do you want me to do?" Finn asked.

"Why don't you break one of the windows?" Blue suggested casually.

"What?" Finn cried, horrified by the suggestion.

"Blue, don't be such an idiot," Shelley muttered.

"You want me to ruin my car?" Finn asked.

"Well unless you've got any better ideas, that's the only way you're getting into it tonight," Blue said calmly.

"By smashing it with a rock?!" Shelley shouted at him like he was being ridiculous. But before she knew it Finn was already looking for something big enough to do some damage.

"Finn, do you really think this is the best idea?" Giggles asked, deciding to step in as Finn picked up a rock roughly the size of his fist.

"It ain't the best idea but it sure will be fun to watch," Butchy said quietly to her, chuckling as she sent him a warning look.

"I can get this replaced, right?" Finn checked as he positioned his arm beside his head.

"Sure," Blue said calmly, sending him a smile that could put anyone at ease.

"Ok, don't worry Carol, I'll get you fixed," Finn said to the car before taking a deep breath and bringing down the rock on the window. But his effort just made Butchy let out a snort because the rock did nothing but crack the glass a little.

"Butchy!" Giggles hissed scoldingly, elbowing him a little harder this time before focusing her attention on Finn. "Finn, that's enough."

"Yeah, wouldn't want to hurt yourself, would yous?" Butchy smirked, knowing fully well that he was provoking the surfer boy, which he enjoyed greatly.

"You think you could do any better Butchy?" Finn asked, finding himself smirking back at the biker boy instead of getting mad.

"Butchy, don't," Giggles warned. She knew Butchy got himself into numerous bad situations through being goaded like this. She just hoped that this time would be different...

Like most of the time, Butchy paid little attention to Giggles' wishes and accepted the offer by strolling up and taking the rock out of Finn's hand. He smirked at the surfer boy one more time before taking a swing at the window. Part of the window shattered instantly, making Shelley and Pearl, who were both stood relatively close to the car when the shower of tiny pieces of glass from the hole sprayed out across the car park, both let out a small shriek or surprise.

"Butchy, stop it," Giggles scolded, watching in dismay as Butchy raised his arm again.

"I've gotta break the whole thing down G, they can't get in when it's like this," Butchy said, flashing her an easy grin that only made Giggles frown harder.

Butchy swung at the window again and again, breaking a little bit more of it down each time. But by the fourth swing, when he broke down the final bottom part of the window, what was left above it came crashing down too and sliced at the skin on his arm. Instinctively Butchy recoiled in shock and dropped the rock, but Finn was the first one to start panicking.

"Oh my God, Butchy," Finn blundered, so startled by the blood that was already leaking from his arm that he didn't know what to do.

"Butchy!" Giggles cried, running over to him and cradling his arm.

"Gee, my night just keeps gettin' better, don't it?" Butchy said sarcastically, wincing as Giggles lightly pressed a finger beside the cut.

"Why do you insist on ignoring me every time I try to help?" Giggles huffed.

"'Cause I think I know best?" Butchy tried, hoping to win a smile off her.

"Do you ever know best though?" Giggles asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

"No," Butchy said sheepishly as Giggles sighed again and began leading him back inside. "Where are we goin'?"

"You need that cleaning up and there's a proper first aid kit in here," Giggles said before pushing him back through the swing doors.

* * *

No matter how much Giggles and one of the kitchen staff members tried to stop the bleeding, nothing quite seemed to work; the cut was pretty deep after all. And after the group of surfers, who had followed the pair back inside in a hurry after the incident, all began freaking out about it, Big Momma's decided to make the call for the ambulance.

"I'm sorry, G," Butchy said sheepishly as one of the paramedics bandaged up his arm.

"You must be pretty sorry," Giggles said, stifling a grin.

"Why?"

"You haven't looked at that paramedic once," she giggled, taking another glance across at the admittedly very pretty nurse.

"I don't need to when I've got you sat here with me," Butchy smirked, leaning forward to peck her on the lips.

"Are you comin' to join us, Giggles?" Struts asked, tottering over to the couple in her hot pink stilettos with ten other girls from the beach in tow. "We're startin' up some karaoke."

"No thanks, I'm fine here," Giggles said, shooting Butchy a smile.

"No, go ahead, I think I can handle sittin' here 'n gettin' my arm strapped up," Butchy chuckled.

"Nonsense, you're not tough enough for that," Giggles teased. "Besides, I'd much rather sit with you anyway."

"Suit yourself!" Struts hollered before scuttling back over to the group of giddy girls.

"Did it really not hurt?" Giggles asked, finding what Butchy had told her hard to believe. It was more likely that he'd just said that to try to impress her.

"No, I think I was just in shock," Butchy said with a slightly bashful chuckle. "It does kinda hurt now though," he admitted quietly, hoping that no one had overheard.

"Aww, Butchy," Giggles said, laying a hand on his uninjured arm. "Well I still think you've been very brave."

"Thanks G," Butchy smiled before leaning in to give her another kiss.

But their moment was ruined by Struts grabbing the microphone. "Right, if ya won't join us for a song then we'll just have to dedicate one to ya," she said. "Giggles, this is for you...and you Butchy, since you're over there with her."

"Thanks Struts," Butchy called across to her, coating his voice with sarcasm.

And with that, the girls began their karaoke version of All I Want For Christmas is you, which thoroughly entertained everyone watching.

"You may need to visit the hospital tomorrow to get that stitched up but for now I think you should be ok," the paramedic that had been bandaging his arm said as she started packing up her things.

"Thanks," Butchy said, gently moving his arm to check that it felt okay. "Boy have I been unlucky today," he then chuckled softly to Giggles.

"I don't know, I'd say you've been pretty lucky," Giggles smirked. "You've got a pretty girl playing doctors with your arm, nine singing for you-"

"But only one that matters," Butchy said, smiling fondly at Giggles, who just blushed and smiled back. He may act like a bit of an bozo sometimes, but Giggles wouldn't change him for the world.

 **So...what did you think? I hope you liked it!**

 **Again, I'm sorry if there are a few mistakes, I'm not checking this one over so that I have time to try to finish the final chapter. I'm pushed for time as it is but I'll try my best to get it done!**

 **Thank you Guest not only for the two reviews you left on yesterday's chapters (which I am very glad that you liked) but for the prompt for this chapter. I know that it's not exactly like you requested but it's near enough considering that I had to fit it into the Christmas party setting. I hope that you don't mind too much and that you still like it!**

 **That's all I've got to say for now! Hopefully I'll see you later if I manage to get the last chapter done! Thank you for reading! Don't forget to leave a review!**

 **-cherrygorilla**


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